I’m JC Penny, lead singer and lyricist for Dirty Penny. I’ve been married for 18 years and it follows that my spouse is sick of my shit by now. She’s over it. If she comes to a show she brings her knitting and only if someone she likes is going too. Sometimes she waits in the car. I can be an exasperating self-involved shit stain, in life and art. Now imagine living with it walking around you everyday for 18 years. Yeah, you start to develop selective hearing and vision for the sake of the relationship.
This is common in the world where relationships meet art. Kathleen Brennan, spouse of Tom Waits, doesn’t think much of Tom’s music. She’s been quoted as saying “It’s all grim reapers and grand weepers.” (agreed, Kathleen) You know who’s not into Bowie? Iman. George Lucas’ first spouse, Marcia, divorced him the year Return of the Jedi came out.
So for my spouse of 18 years to come to me independently a few months after the release of this latest album and out of the blue tell me “holy shit, Jay, your album is so fucking good” that for me means we’ve achieved artistic excellence. She wasn’t looking for anything or wanted me to wash the car. She just said it. “Holy fuck!” I replied and kept saying it the rest of the day. I’ve told the band who know my wife and I well and they also agree this is a huge breakthrough. Normally it takes decades and millions of bits of praise to be able to finally declare any work of art as timeless genius. Life is wonderful. I didn’t know this could happen. We did it. We really did it.