A Brokeheart Pro

antiMUSIC: What did your family think of the record when hearing it for the first time? It must have been a shock to hear stuff like "Girl Noise" and "Can I Call You Daddy?"

A Brokeheart Pro: You know, I talk like that with my parents whether they want to hear it or not. I've always been like that. And I always have questions. And you know I was a virgin until I was married but I got married at 17 because I wanted to do it. You know, I was born and raised in a very catholic household. But that wasn't it. My thing was I wanted it to be my idea to do it. And you know when you're around teenage boys, it's always his idea. (laughs) cause that's all he's thinking about. So I made the poor guy wait a couple of years and then we got married right out of high school. I mean you know it's no basis for a marriage I guess. But you know, I used to talk like that. I was very curious about masturbation and all that stuff and I thought that the whole thing about it was funny. I wasn't trying to shock my parents at all. That was just how I talk. And they accepted that, but when I was exposing it to other people I think they were afraid for me too, like what are they going to think of her? What are they going to think of us? It goes back to stuff like that, with parents. When my mom first heard the record, I think she was proud, I do. But I don't think she really let out. And I was dropped, the first thing she said was: "What did you do?" And I was already miserable, and I was like: "Well I guess I f**ked up mom". You know, she was like: "Yeah, I guess you did." I thought, probably if I was rich and famous, I would have redeemed her. But you know, there I was, back at home.

antiMUSIC: Can you describe how The Chubbies come together?

A Brokeheart Pro: Well, let's see. I came back home. I had nothing. Because I've been cutting hair since I was 17, so I started working at this crappy little salon. I was recording at night and would make little cassettes and sell them at punk rock shows. And I would show up and people knew who I was and what had happened to me and here I am selling these cassettes for a dollar. It's like, in a way, they probably thought I had no pride, but what am I going to do? It's the only thing I know how to do. And I didn't care how humiliating it was for me, because all I ever wanted is to do that. These tapes, people were buying them, I'd sell 20 at a show, and that would be gas money, I'd have 20 bucks. And one of them got in the hands of Long Gone John. He called me within 15 seconds of it. And I'm trying to think, it was probably 11 months, in between being dropped and him asking, "Well what do you want to do?" And I said: "I want to make a record" and he said. "Ok". But I said; "I've got to tell you, I don't have a band. What you hear is what I am." And he said: "Good. That's why I like it. In fact, I want to put two of the songs on 7 inches the way there are. And I thought okay. And I didn't know who he was. I was like, "Oh, all right. Let's do that thing then." And I did that, and I booked a seven week tour within two months. And that's something I'd never even done. I had never even played in a band live. So I just stuck myself out there. Because once you've fallen that far down, what's the difference? You're just, "Okay, I can sleep on people's couches." Every now and then, people would go, wait a minute. Like I'd be in a small town where maybe one person had the Pink Mischief record, and they'd go, "Wait a minute. Aren't you that girl?" And I'd just kinda go: "Yeah, that's me." And they'd go; "Wow, poor thing."

antiMUSIC: If I'm understanding it correctly, you began The Chubbies playing everything except drums right off the bat, as well as recording. Where did you get your recording and bass playing know-how?

A Brokeheart Pro: I still don't feel like I have any knowledge of it. I don't know. (laughs) Honestly Morley if you were to hand me something I could probably play it, even if I had never seen it before. I don't know. I'm not good at anything, I never practice, and I know you should never say that and I know that's a total slap in the face to a lot of people who are really dedicated too, but what I really practice is songwriting so they can shut up. Because I do practice that all the time. But I never practice an instrument. I could not care less. As long as I'm getting what I need out of my head out of the instrument, I'm fine. I like Van Halen. You can't go wrong with pop metal at all. And I like the way Eddie Van Halen plays all those runs. Yet it's weird, only certain people can pull that off. And Brian Setzer is one of my favorite, favorite artists and one of the most amazing guitarists in the world. But just a few people, a lick for lick's sake, I could give a crap…Satriani, Yngwie Malmsteen, I don't care about that stuff. The song has got to be the thing, and the voice. When you hear a voice that just breaks your heart and you just go "Oh, man." That just makes you want to live another day. 

antiMUSIC: I know the feeling. "You Don't Know".

A Brokeheart Pro: Oh, thank you for that

antiMUSIC: So when you look back at the Chubbies, that whole experience. First time in a real band, what was it like?

A Brokeheart Pro: Well, I tried my stuff out here first of course. And we did a couple of shows and we weren't very good. And I started with other players, I found Christine just a little bit later on, and we always brought in other bass players, but she and I always kinda had a chemistry that was very hard to break in on. So we ended up being a duo obviously. And it was amazing. I mean we went everywhere. We went across the United States a couple of times. We went to Europe and did like nine countries in 30 days, something like that. We went to Canada, and I have a lot of relatives up there obviously, being French. So, that's where they came to first actually, in Québec and lot of them moved to Victoria and taught and things like that, yeah. There's a lot of Canadians in my family. More on my mom's family. More of them live in Canada than live in France. It's weird because I kinda get a lot of people who like my stuff from Canada. And I always think that's very interesting because one: Canadians are very picky, no offense. It seems to me they are. They like certain things. They're not…and if you play for them, you better bring it. That was one thing I learned, because they don't like any nonsense. We played a lot of oh you know, small teeny tiny towns, a lot of basements. Nobody could ever say I didn't pay my dues. That's for sure. And you know what's weird, is I'm still paying my dues. I'm like, damn, when they gonna let me in the club…Jesus.

antiMUSIC: So back up to the present, what are your plans around this record? Have you thought about touring or is that not in the cards at the moment?

A Brokeheart Pro: I want to so much. But I have to keep the job because I have to keep the house for my son. And you have to live a life. That's one thing I can say I always lived a life, but I always worked really hard at what I do musically, so… I didn't want to miss out being a woman. It's very important to me. I'm very traditional; I don't look it but I'm very traditional as far as certain things go. And I enjoy it. I don't want to enjoy it. Cause what are you going to have to write about if you don't live. You know what you end up writing about? You end up writing about the inside of your bus. We had a short bus, and touring and it's a lonely life. It just becomes boring and who can relate to it? Like 10 people out on the road, you know. You want to live. So I miss touring. I plan on it. I'd love to do it in the middle of summer towards the end of summer. But I want good people around me. I don't want players who look to me to do everything. I've done that. I don't want to do it anymore. I want them to love it and respect it as much as I do. And they've got to work as hard as I do. That's a lot to ask.

antiMUSIC: That's the thing you always hear. You can always find players but it's the personalities involved.. 

A Brokeheart Pro: Ah, they're all a**holes. I'm constantly amazed at how flakey they are. Get it together.

antiMUSIC: You've posted some excerpts of a story. You've hinted that this might be forming the basis of the next record. These are very interesting pieces of text. 

A Brokeheart Pro: (laughs) It's something I've never done. You're talking about the Josephine thing?

antiMUSIC: Yeah.

A Brokeheart Pro: I've never done it like that before. One, I've never shared my ideas before I put them out because I usually keep notebooks of chord progressions, little melodies and sometimes a phrase here and there. And they'll be a pile of notebooks and I'll just go back and look at them. I also have this little tape recorder I've had for like 10 years that I would just play guitar or sing into it. And this came all at one. This is my life, but, as if it was deadwood. (laughs), you know? It's obviously a metaphor. It's how it feels. And I'm so friggin excited about it. And I have to stop myself because I started writing it, but I've actually got to give this first album a chance or this second album isn't going to make any sense. 

antiMUSIC: How do these pieces that you've posted on the net relate to the actual record. You're not taking those actual words…

A Brokeheart Pro: Yeah, you'll see. You'll catch a phrase. A title, the feeling of each piece is probably one song. So, and it's one part of it, and I'm going to try and keep it as orderly as possible. The saga is not finished yet in my life, it's still going on. (laughs) It's still a nightmare. I write it as I go. Which really pisses him off by the way. Oh my god, it just pisses him off. I keep thinking, "Why do I keep doing this? He's still so mad at me."

antiMUSIC: Because it's fun?

A Brokeheart Pro: Yeah, it's a little fun. I'm so awful.

antiMUSIC: Plans for the rest of the year, in terms of this record, will you be doing anything else to support or promote it.

A Brokeheart Pro: Well, I'm trying to do it, the way you would do it if you were a record company, an Indie record label, and I've tried to follow a lot of examples and what they do. It's A LOT of work. I had no frickin idea. Because I've always done PR and stuff but not to this extent. I mean I'm starting completely over. Nobody knows who I am. They don't know who A Brokeheart Pro is. Every now and then someone will catch it but, really, I'm a new artist and I'm introducing myself to this whole new world out there, this Internet world and using it. And it's actually, I love it, I love doing it. That's how I found you!

antiMUSIC: It's just so amazing that way, isn't it…the Internet? Like you said, I looked up your name and found you. I mean you're reaching people across the planet, you've got all these Canadian fans and you don't have to leave your backyard.

A Brokeheart Pro: And they don't either. God knows they don't want to come here. (laughs) I love it.

antiMUSIC: You were saying how pathetic your life is about doing the videos in your backyard. Well, I happen to think that's brilliant. The videos exactly fit your music. You're doing them on your own and on your own terms. You post them on YouTube and there you go. Who the hell needs MTV?

A Brokeheart Pro: I know (laughs). They cost me nothing. And literally they cost me nothing. My record cost me nothing. Nothing to make. I had to press it and that cost me something. But literally there's no studio time involved. It's just one lesson for the kids: if you really, really believe in what you do, you know, all that other stuff: spending 8 hours to get a snare sound, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. It never did.

antiMUSIC: Well, I could go on for hours but to keep it from turning into a novel, I'd better let you go. Is there anything else you would like to tell us that I didn't ask?

A Brokeheart Pro: Just that you can get the record on iTunes, or CD Baby, (laughs) you know all that stuff where you can get it. It's available. 

Morley and antiMUSIC thank Jeannette for taking the time to speak with us.

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