The soft-spoken, blue-eyed former N'Sync member JC Chasez sat in a large conference room in the depths of the Kiss 98.5 studios Friday afternoon while in Buffalo promoting his new single, "Until Yesterday," and the release of his sophomore album in March.
He wore his signature long black pea coat, a black and white scarf with skulls and dark designer jeans. His manager, also with perfectly placed hair, sat next to him silently texting while he sat down with The Spectrum for a private interview.
S: Walking into the building I saw a group of girls whom I could only assume were your lunch dates from (a) Kiss 98.5 contest. I heard one of them said, "I just wanted him to take his sweater off." What is your reaction to those types of comments?
JC: (Laughing) Uh, I don't think that's appropriate.
S: I went home last weekend to find my three younger sisters and my mother dancing in the middle of the kitchen to "Until Yesterday." This song is going into the homes of America, how does that make you feel?
JC: It gets me excited. I've spent over a year putting this record together. I was very meticulous, I put my heart into this thing and now that it's finally going out there it means everything to me. I love to see people enjoying it. That's the reason I made it. I have these ideas and I want to share them with people.
S: How important is the success of this to you? You've been out of the limelight for a while.
JC: The most important thing to me is that people enjoy the music, I don't necessarily need the spotlight. I don't need to be the most famous guy. As long as everybody's listening to the song I'm happy.
S: Are you feeling a lot of pressure? Your first solo album in 2004, "Schizophrenic," wasn't a great success.
JC: The only pressure is the pressure I put on myself. Everybody's their own worst critic and everybody has their own idea of what success is. Of course, I want people to hear this stuff. I feel like this is my contribution to the world. This is what I do so I really want people to go out there and enjoy it and I'm going to work day and night to get people to listen to this stuff.
S: Is the new CD complete?
JC: Yeah, other than a few mixes I'm done writing it, I'm done producing it. Now it's just sending it out to the right mixers, and that's just a matter of working out schedules.
S: Is it similar to the single? Or completely different?
JC: I would say the energy is the same. The thing about the single is I feel like it's a well-written song. And I think I made a conscious effort to put thought into every record on this album. I didn't want (anything just) filling up space. I wanted the music to be great but I wanted the stories to be great as well, so I concentrated on that aspect of it just as hard. Every aspect of each song I've really combed and put all of my energy into it.
S: You achieved the dream with N'Sync. What are your new dreams?
JC: Everything comes in stages. When I was touring we just wanted to give everyone the greatest show they've ever seen. That's why we were shooting rockets in the air and we're jumping on walls and sticking to them, any idea that really showed people a good time. Now with my solo record, I really want to be a part of a song that could be played in ten or fifteen years and be the song that everybody has a great time to.
S: Do you think Justin is really bringing sexy back?
JC: Uh, at this point it's going to be hard to dispute it actually. He seems to be the popular choice, so I would guess so.
S: Where do you keep your N'Sync memorabilia?
JC: I have a few things in my office and then the rest of it is in my closet and under my bed. They're not in the living room or anywhere like that. I have a little office in my place in Orlando and so some of that stuffs up there. Not a lot of people get to see it. My buddies, they'll come in and pick up the moon man and play with the flag and pull it apart. You're like, "Hey man, can you not like break it, cuz its pretty cool." It will be something for the future, but right now I don't even need to look at those things. It's not where my minds at, my minds at the road in front of me.
S: Who are some of your favorite artists? Who's on your iPod?
JC: Jeez, um. We've listened to some weird, well not weird, just like ridiculous songs today. We were talking a lot about Madonna actually, and how underrated her last record was, "Confessions of a Dancer." We listened to it for a couple days and just talked about how well orchestrated that was. She literally took the same bpm and made every record interesting. It felt like that record was really over looked. I would say Madonna is one of the top on my list right now.
S: You have a busy schedule now promoting your new CD, you're in a different town everyday, how do you de-stress at the end of the day?
JC: It doesn't feel like pressure to me, I'm actually pretty lucky. I just go in and play my tunes. The toughest part is getting from A to B. Once I'm there I'm fine. Traveling isn't hard it's just monotonous. I used to keep a journal. Right now I'm just trying to get my rest in whenever I can. You just kind of want to slow down while you're traveling as much as you can so you can give everybody your best when you get there.
S: Are you a fan of American Idol?
JC: I know a little bit about it, I went to see a live taping once, so that was fun.
S: What would Simon Cowell say to you?
JC: I think he'd like my voice. As much as people don't like him, he says his mind. I'm a bit shy at times. He might ask me to come out of my shell.
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
