Laundry List: Joseph of Mercury x East Dane
Laundry List: Joseph of Mercury x East Dane
Laundry List v3.0 happy summer! EastDane x Textstyles sat down with Joseph W. Salusbury also known as Joseph of Mercury. Joseph emerged from the ranks of Fritz Helder & The Phantoms to launch his own band and recently taken his music one step further with a solo career. Shining some bright white light on Toronto’s indie music scene.
I met Joseph many moons ago at an art party in a converted office space downtown. Since, Joseph has become a mainstay in the fashion scene and you’ve probably seen him all over the party pages. For me it was the white leather jacket he wore everywhere, clearly a nod to MJ, but there’s something I find so intriguing about uniform dressing. We met up at Mercury Espresso Bar in Toronto’s east end to talk music, French immersion and how he’s got no love for Mariah Carey.
Read on to see Joseph’s Laundry List:
What does fashion mean to you as a musician?
I feel like when you start off in any art form so much of your mind is caught up in doing what you’re doing; because you’re not very good at it yet and it takes up all of your time. When I had the space in my head to think about not just the sound but also the visual of it. You start to get into the videos and the artwork and branding, which is this next level of attention to your project. Fashion is really just a part of that and its just another avenue of expression of my aesthetic.
How did you approach fashion before?
I think (pauses and says ‘Hello’ to a fan passing by) I suppose I felt most comfortable in suits. I wore a lot of button up and dress pants and felt more comfortable in that. I would go everywhere like that and if I needed to get somewhere would just start sprinting in that clothing.
Where were you living?
In the east end I wasn’t visible yet.
When you say dressed up do you mean like Brooks Brothers?
Kind of nice dress pants and dress shoes.
Is this when you first came to Toronto?
I grew up here.
How did I get that twisted? Where’d you go to school?
I went to Rosedale and Jackman.
No you did not!
I did.
I went to Jackman too! I’m an 84 baby, were we there at the same time?
Well, I’m an 89 baby.
No Way! Wait, were you in English, cause I was in French, that’s probably why we didn’t know each other?
Yeah, there was such a divide.
Yeah, the Frenchie kids we were always so other.
There was no mixing. Even the kids that went into French immersion after couldn’t talk to them (to the English speaking kids).
Do you feel like the English kids dressed differently than the French?
There was one teacher that wore a beret a lot, you remember that guy?
That was my grade 4 teacher!
There were a lot of really great teachers there. But then I had one terrible teacher Mr. Sperry whose face looked like a skull.
Was music always part of your life?
I didn’t even like music until I went to Rosedale and heard music that I liked.
What was it?
Yann Tiersen, which is like…
Amélie!
And Elliott Smith. That was the first music I liked because before that my family listened to such terrible music. My mother would play really random adult contemporary stuff and she didn’t listen to too much. And then my older and younger sister listened to a lot of Mariah Carey.
Wait, you’re telling me there’s no soft spot for Mariah Carey in your heart?
No. The tone of her voice makes me so… it really bothers me. My father listened to old country music. No good stuff, just really honky tonk.
No Patsy Cline?
No and like these old epic folk songs like the Dutchmen that just went on forever. I thought music just wasn’t something that I liked. Then I got to high school.
You had the awakening.
Yeah and I found more orchestral ambient music and I don’t know if my brain knew that I’d be a song writer late on but it was just a lot easier to hear my own melodies and my own words when I wasn’t listening to something that had a vocal. It was just all groove or mood or the ambiance. Even in music with lyrics I gravitated towards music that was more cinematic in quality with strong kind of visual component.
The big swell.
That evoked a picture. Sorry I think I forgot the question.
I don’t think there was one… really great interviewer!
Oh, sorry back to fashion as a musician it’s an expression of your aesthetic and I feel that just as an artist, you find all these ways to express yourself that fill those things with your sensibility. Beyond that in the more practical sense of things I came up with Fritz Helder and the Phantoms and they really instilled in me a love for the theatricality and sincere theatricality where it’s about finding a piece of clothing and a your relationship to that piece of clothing, put you into the space you need to be into to perform. It gets you excited and you feel regal, or powerful or it gets you crazy. These are costumes that allow you to get into that headspace, like soft method acting, that’s a little more than yourself. If you want people to watch you, you need to engage them more than say the person standing beside them.
Is it safe to say yours would be the white leather jacket?
The white leather jacket came about a few years ago when I was looking for something for one of the first shows. We were playing at the silver dollar and I went out and found some cool pieces that I’d found before when I was in the band Polynesian Bride and we used to have theme shows. So we’d go out and find our piece of clothing, which became this ritualistic way to play a show. We’d have our practice and decide the theme and then everyone would go out and find their representation of the theme. When we came back together it was a real excitement. For me I really wanted to recreate that. So as my first show with my own band, I walked into Exile on Kensington and there was the white leather jacket. I thought this definitely isn’t going to fit me but I put it on and it immediately fit so well. I wasn’t out there looking for a white leather jacket, or a leather jacket at all because it’s actually the most impractical thing when you’re playing on stage. It’s very warm. I put it on and it felt great and I wore it that night and kind of felt the character that that jacket created.
What does it evoke for you?
Generally speaking I become a lot more outwardly social. Because of the extroverts I apprenticed with. From Fritz to Zion, these guys that were really important role models and they are really charismatic.
What’s interesting is Fritz is openly gay and Zion displays this homoeroticism from a straight man.
Yeah, hyper masculinity does become gay culture, because it’s all masculine. There is no femininity to balance it. Yeah they are both just really charismatic guys and I became more social and I’ve learned how to be a modern man from a tiny gay black man and a big handsome white guy.
Who better?!
I’m very much an introvert and find myself in a position of observation, without judgment, but also because I don’t drink or take any drugs I still go out and stay out all hours and enjoy and revel in the night. But a part of me is always observing a part of me is always set aside like you said. Having that white leather jacket on stage, I feel like it separates me, even further and in a different way. I feel like a ghost watching a crowd. I prefer things when they aren’t what they are. I love when instruments are played not in the way they were intended. I love when you’re watching a film and you forget that it’s a film and you forget that you exist. I love things that take you out of the equation and come at you in a way you’re not necessarily familiar with.
Sneak attack.
I’m not into acquired taste and I don’t like to talk when I’m on stage. It works for some, but it doesn’t seem sincere usually and I think that’s why I never started drinking coffee or alcohol. It just never tasted good and felt like too much work to acquire taste that’s not that good for me anyway. I feel like my music is more than words.
It’s your form of communication.
I’ll say thank you after a song…
Good Canadian boy!
Yeah, I may react to things but if nothing calls me to speak then I wont.
What was the most magical show you ever played? You know that feeling when you’re in complete synchronicity and everything just falls away.
Most magical would have to be at the ROM last summer. That massive hall, the giant statues around and the collected history of that space it was a very specific energy.
What are the acoustics like in there?
They’re awful! For most people because it’s very hard to get a very tight sound it’s too cacophonous. But my music is very haunting and spacious and it kind of works for me. I turned down all the reverb and it worked out quite well.
Where does Joseph of Mercury begin and end?
This has really just become the center of my universe and everything is just a prism of it.
There isn’t a Joe in sweatpants?
No, whether it’s healthy or not, is to be determined. But it doesn’t feel stressful it doesn’t feel wrong; I’m not tiring of it. I get back more than I give in. it’s just so fulfilling. The more that I pour into it the better I get at it.
Which designers have you worked with?
Evan Biddell made me a white leather jacket, modeled after my first one but it has removable sleeves. It was a nice take on the original and it was great to remove the sleeves. Parris Gordon from Beaufille made me this ring, which I’ve worn, into the ground. I found the crystals but she set it and we collaborated together and pool our excitement. Sarah Jay patterned my original white jacket so that I could get the gold one made. To take the old and make something new and exciting was a great way to move into the solo position. And people love gold parties!
Oh they do!
Everyone has gold theme parties all the time so I’m fine.
What’s next for Joseph of Mercury?
I’m working with The Collections for a few fashion films for Disconnect. And I’m working on my next album.
That’s so exciting and best of luck!
From top left around: J Brand leather jean; Miansai leather journal; Marc by Marc Jacobs sweater; H by Hudson boots; Public School wool vest; J Brand Cadmus leather jogging pants; Patrik Ervell collar shirt; Lotuff leather travel kit; Battenwear shirt; Viktor & Rolf leather strap shoes.
Other Laundry Lists:
Grant Van Gameren
Parambir Singh Keila
