Milwaukee native Nick Venturella has been playing music for eight years and in the past few months he's really begun to get noticed, thanks to the December 2001 launch of his debut disc, "Voices of Home," released on his own OatMeal Records, based in Waukesha.
Venturella's well-crafted folk-infused rock songs were enhanced at the CD's release party by the exhibition of Venturella's visual art and a fictional story that tied everything together. Since then, Venturella, 22, has been playing around Wisconsin and Minnesota and is already working on the follow-up to "Voices of Home," which is due for release in early 2003.
He took some time out of working on that disc to talk to OnMilwaukee.com about "Voices of Home" and the intersection of visual and musical art.
OMC: Nick, tell us about your background. How did you begin making music?
NV: I'm the youngest in my family. My two older brothers -- who are four and five years older than me -- were always involved in music, so I grew up around it. My parents are not musical or artistic at all, which I find humorous, although they are very supportive of what I do.
When I was about 11 years old I joined the school band playing the clarinet, then by the time I was about 14 years old I got a guitar, which quickly became the vehicle needed to express my musical passion. I was in a four-piece alternative rock band in high school called "Din Addiction," then my role was simply a guitar player I didn't sing at all.
After most of that band set out for college there was only two of us left that wanted to continue playing together so we went acoustic taking that alternative rock element and "mellowing it out" a bit, this is where I started to sing a little bit doing mainly backing harmonies. That duo was called "Gemini's Rival." Then while I was in Madison, earning my visual art degree at Edgewood College, I started doing quite a bit a solo performing.
All along I had been continually writing new music. Now that I think about it, I have been writing music since before I had a guitar...I would piece together stories I had in my head that would rhyme then write it down in a notebook, and fiddle with my oldest brother's keyboard to try and come up with a melody. My brothers, Mike and Tim Venturella were huge influences on my musical beginnings because I looked up to them more than anything. Tim is actually the drummer you'll hear on a few of the "Voices of Home" tracks.
OMC: You are also a visual artist, we hear. How does your visual art affect your music and vice versa? Or doesn't it?
NV: The music and the art often intertwine with each other ... not always, but for the past couple of years they have definitely been working together in some way, shape or form. Sometimes I'll have a visual image in my head that will inspire a theme for a musical piece or vice versa. I often associate musical chordings with colors. For example I'll play a certain chord on the guitar and its sound will remind me of a color, and those colors lead to associations with certain emotions, a chain of associations may then continue. Hence, expression involving art, music, and writing is a very circular thing for me; they all interact and react with one another...sometimes consciously and sometimes subconsciously.
OMC: Tell us about your CD "Voices of Home" and the CD release party, which also was a show of some of your artwork.
NV: "Voices of Home," was my first full-length solo album, which also happened to be the musical portion to my multi-faceted one-man-show/art exhibit. The show contained a written fictional story told through letters that the two characters wrote back and forth to each other. Those letters (for the purpose of the show) were pre-recorded being read aloud by actors. The musical portion of the show (which is the "Voices of Home" album) became more of the reactions that the characters in the story had to each of the letters. Then the artwork was hung on the walls, so people could walk around and view the work.
The artwork was more of a visual expression of the characters' thoughts and feelings. In a nutshell this is how the show worked: In chronological order of the story the first letter was played from the recorded reading, then the corilating song was performed live, which corilated to the first art piece, and the rest of the show followed in that fashion until all 12 sets of letters were read, all 12 songs (from the album) were performed, and all 12 pieces of art were viewed. And the best part was ... the audience didn't miss a beat because they got to follow along with the program that was handed out at the beginning of the night, whcih contained all the letters and song lyrics typed out as well as a black & white thumbnail of each artwork.
OMC: What do you derive from your music and from your visual art? Do they express different things or are they different expressions of the same feelings?
NV: As I said before the art and music stuff is very circular. In both cases they're expressions of emotions and thoughts that are very close to me. The act of expressing is a very therapeutic activity. A lot of times the stories in my music and what's portrayed in my visual art are actual events or encounters I've had or my friends have had and I've simply fictionalized some of the details to possibly make it a bit more interesting and also to protect others' privacy...I'm not trying to offend anyone with the things I create. But because the things I create, artistically/musically, are based in real life and often on real events many people young and old alike can relate to it.
OMC: Who inspires you musically? There are traces of all kinds of people in your music: inspired rockers like Bruce Springsteen, as well as folkier influences.
NV: Bruce Springsteen is definitely a top notch songwriter, but there are quite a few musical artists that are closer to home that have inspired me such as, Willy Porter, Bodeans and bands that I've actually had the opportunity to open for like Fade 2 Shade from Minneapolis and Life in General from North Carolina. But the influences don't necessarily stop or start with anyone of the previously mentioned. There's also Led Zeppelin, James Taylor, Rage Against the Machine, Extreme, The Refreshments, Barenaked Ladies, Harry Conick Jr., Stevie Ray Vaughn, Big Head Todd and the Monsters, Def Leppard, Sublime, Less Than Jake, Aerosmith, Otis Redding, Miles Davis ... and many more.
OMC: Do you have a band or do you prefer to play solo?
NV: At the moment I'm performing my music solo, but with the right people and instrumentation I could see it expanding into a band format, we'll see, I like to options, but for now I'm content.
{INSERT_RELATED}OMC: What's your next project?
NV: I'm currently working on my next full length album, "Closure," which will have visual art and a written story that will go together in a similar fashion as "Voices of Home." I'm really excited about this new project, but I have to refrain from giving away too much, so regretfully that's about all I say about it. I expect the project to be finished sometime in January 2003. Then I'm hoping to approach art galleries to show the artwork and set up two or three performances of the entire story/musical/art show at each gallery that I'm able to show in. Also I will continue to do straight music performances at most any venue that will have me, which includes private parties and colleges.
You can keep up with Venturella's doings by visiting his Web site.
Nick Venturella will perform Fri., Oct. 11 at 7 p.m. at Stackbucks Coffee in Waukesha, and at 7:30 p.m., Fri., Oct. 25 at Starbucks Coffee in Wauwatosa. He also appears at Oconomowoc's Books & Co., Sat., Nov. 2 at 7 p.m.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
