Interviews

Shanti Wintergate and Greg Attonito

Interview with Shanti Wintergate and Greg Attonito on Oct 25, 2007 by

An email interview with Shanti Wintergate and Gregory Attonito in October 2007

If you're the average reader of this site, you might know Shanti Wintergate as an indie pop-rocker from Hollywood. You'd probably also know that Greg Attonito is the front man for those veteran Jersey punks The Bouncing Souls. What you may not know is that the two are married and recently completed a children's book together that Wintergate wrote and Attonito illustrated. It's called I Went for a Walk, and here's my quick pitch: it's a really cool book that, if you're even remotely interested in the artistic ventures of these two, you should definitely check out. It's much more than just a simple children's book, and if you don't want to drop 20 of your hard earned dollars on it, you should at least find it at a library and give a skim. That's enough for my pitch; here's the interview I got to do, via email, with Shanti Wintergate and Gregory Attonito regarding their new book, I Went for a Walk.

By: William Jones

Shanti, your webpage says you've written a number of children's stories and this is the first to be published. How many have you written? How long have you been writing children's stories for? Do you think you'd like to continue doing projects like this in the future?

Shanti Wintergate: I have a handful of other children's stories that I've written and would like to eventually publish. Even as a child, I loved writing stories, poetry, and songs, so I guess you could say I've been writing since then. I would love to continue creating projects like this in the future. I have so many fun ideas to share with the world!

Shanti, the "About the..." section says you got the idea while sitting at a cafe in Venice, Cali. Was there anything in particular around the cafe that inspired the first lines of the poem that turned into this story, or did it just come out of thin air?

SW: I was at a café and I was eating a snack and having some tea...The first few lines definitely came out of thin air and then I was inspired to continue the story. I've always had a passion for science and love toying with the idea that earth could possibly be a grain of sand on someone else's beach, which makes us just little quarks in the equation. I imagine the "food" search of the story might have had something to do with me being hungry at the time inspiration struck!

Obviously, you're both well-established in your own musical careers; what is the interest for you in creating a book for children over, say, some sort of adult-oriented story and/or artwork? Do you have or plan to have any children of your own?

Greg Attonito: The story kind of jumped out at me and compelled me to work with it. I had only done artwork for fun up to that point so I just started doing the children's book for fun. It came naturally. I have also done a lot of bigger paintings that could be considered for adults. Shanti and I like to paint, so hopefully we will have more time to enjoy it in the future. Maybe we will even have an art show someday. No plans to have our own kids at the moment.

SW: I've always loved children's books. Some of my favorites were simplistic but deep and silly but true. I love kids. In fact, I feel like I have more in common with children than "Adults" sometimes. In my life as a creative person I'm constantly trying new things and it is here that I'd like to refer to a favorite poem and song. "Row, Row, Row your boat gently down the stream. Merrily, Merrily, Merrily, life is but a dream!" When that creativity strikes, I have to go with it. This dream called Life is too short to fight the flow. Other stories or books might come out of me in the future, but right now this is a BLAST! As far as children of my own... no plans... yet. We've got nephews and a niece to keep us busy along with all the great kids we've been meeting on our tours!!

How long would you say each of you put into your respective parts of the book? How long has it taken this project to evolve?

GA: It's been about five years since Shanti wrote the first part of the story. The art took about four years and the layout and searching for a printer has happened in this last year. Shanti took care of all the layout and the clean-up on some of my messy paintings. She taught herself how to do it. I was impressed because she did a great job. A lot of love is in that book along with lot of artistic trial and error.

SW: In the last five years, we both put in all the time we could to make this happen. Whether it was supportive time, suggestive time, or good hard manual labor we both were there, collectively, as a whole. I couldn't have done everything I did without getting Greg's opinion and vice-versa. Although most of the writing was done within a few weeks, I also did all of the computer geek stuff (layout, design, etc). The artwork took the longest, but it was time well worth it. I love the illustrations.

Would you say the book is strictly for children, or do you think older audiences, particularly those of your respective musical fans, could get something out of this story and art as well?

GA: All the really great children's books hit on deeply important human issues. One good example is The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein. Every time I read that book I see it a little differently. That's a sign of a great creation. I think IWFAW has that quality to it. There are so many lessons for everyone to learn in this book. When we become adults we tend to forget what's important. We tend to worry too much and not remember how to play. We tend to forget the basic stuff we were taught in kindergarten even. For example: Respect your neighbor and your neighbor's space. Some individuals in our current government administration didn't seem to pick that lesson up. Maybe they should read IWFAW.

SW: Most definitely anyone could get something out of this book. Somewhere we're all really kids at heart and I feel like this book touches that bit of all of us. This story takes us out of our daily "boxes" we have placed around what we think we know.

How would you explain the themes of the book? What would you say each of the three different planets represents?

GA: I could probably write a huge essay on this question alone. There really are a lot of subjects and themes that are touched in the story.

In Chapter 1 "Earth" we visit the familiar places and animals we have already seen. It's the perfect place to start because we all share the earth as a reference point of understanding. It's where we all have our foundation. At the end of chapter one, the character flies up into space and sits on a star. This is our first jump into "non-reality" and is the catapult into the uncharted territory that is the rest of the book. So we could say the theme of the first chapter is The Foundation.

Chapter 2 "Moove" opens us up to possibilities that we only dream of as ordinary earthbound humans. We have the ability to fly into any part of outer space just with a thought and we are able to interact with new and unfamiliar beings. New Potential could be the theme for Chapter 2.
Chapter 3 "IZ" takes us past the illusion of time and space. Our size has no significance anymore and we find that consciousness exists everywhere in endless and unfathomable ways. We find ourselves in a place where love is what fulfills us. Moments are all we need. So the theme of Chapter 3 could be living in the completeness and love of a moment.

SW: I think Earth represents nature, Moove represents art/music and IZ represents peace with one's self. Truly each planet represents something different to each of us. The character is driven by a hunger and realizes that other people fulfill their hunger with different things. Yes, at the end there's a stack of yummy pancakes waiting for you to gobble down, but the character's perspective has changed.

Greg, aside from not drawing anything that would be considered unacceptable for kids, how do you approach art intended for kids differently than you would some other project?

GA: I learned to pay attention to how I was feeling when I was drawing. If I didn't feel good about what I was doing, I would just put the drawing down and come back to it later. It was important that each drawing worked as a whole and the style was consistent. That was a process of trial and error that was pretty tricky at times.

Greg, on the technical side of things, how were these pictures made?

GA: They are almost all done in paint pen on 9 by 14 sketchbook paper. A few markers were used, but not many. The colors of the paint pens are great; you just can't really mix them so easily. Thanks goes to Shanti for cleaning up some of the messy ones. Paint pens explode on a regular basis and they are extremely unpredictable.

How did the West Coast portion of the book tour go? Although it sounded like many of them were taking place at schools, did you have a lot of Souls and Shanti music fans coming out to meet you?

GA: There always seemed to be at least one and in some places there were a lot. It's always great to see some friendly faces when you are traveling. It was also kind of cool to see how the book would stand up on its own. We were really happy with how much the teachers and kids loved it.

SW: It was so much fun. All the kids were amazing and so much fun to be with. Most of our contact people at the schools were ‘Souls or Shanti fans themselves. When we weren't at schools, the ‘Souls and Shanti fans were there with bells on. We thank everyone so much for the support. So much love and we couldn't have done any of this without them.

Have you found that music-related name-recognition helps a book like this get some more attention, or is it starting from scratch, trying to make a name for yourselves in an entirely different industry?

GA: We definitely had a head start. Fans of our music would have noticed and been interested in our book just because we put one out, but if it was no good, it wouldn't last. The book stands on it's own without any fame or reputations tacked on. We are getting great reviews from people who have no idea we are musicians.

SW: It's a little bit of both. Having some recognition with the music definitely helps because we already have an established fan base that has an interest in other projects that we're doing. So, yes I think it definitely helps. Hopefully, that starting point will just keep growing. I don't know if it will help us get on the best-seller list or Oprah...but maybe we'll have a chance on Reading Rainbow or Sesame Street! That would be awesome!

It seems that other than Shanti receiving credit for one Souls song, I believe, this is the first public project you two have come together on. Do you plan to do more things like this together? Do you have any plans for any musical collaboration, or possibly any music geared towards children in the future?

GA: Yes, we have written a few kids songs that we play at our readings. So many people along the tour asked if we had a CD of the kids music. Good kids music is hard to find these days, so we better start recording.

SW: Yes, more please! I hope this is the beginning of a beautiful collaborative empire. We have a couple more stories in the works and we're planning on releasing some children's music soon.

How would you describe the experience of working with your spouse on a project such as this?

GA: It's rewarding and it's scary. You don't want to blow it because you can't just quit and move on to another job. We really love each other and we love what we are doing, so it can get pretty intense sometimes...maybe that's what makes our creations interesting.

SW: For me, it has been truly amazing. Who else would I want to work with? There's a degree of comfort that I know and trust. It makes for a truly creative environment. But that's only the half of it...because of the fact that we published the book on our own imprint, Hollywood Jersey, there are a number of technical and business things that we also have to keep track of. That's the only department where we both have to work a little harder. It's not as "fun," but it's part of the whole adventure.

A sincere thank you to Shanti Wintergate and Greg Attonito for taking time out of their busy schedules to answer these questions and for putting together such a cool book for both kids and adults to enjoy. And thanks to Vanessa at Fat Wreck and Mutiny PR for setting everything up.

www.hollywoodjersey.com