Case Returns With The Rose Experience

So you mentioned the album's a little lighter, it's got a few more of these songs on em. How would you compare it overall to your older work?

I think it's consistent with the other work, but like I said, the way it actually sounds - like for instance, songs like "Happily Ever After" and "Missing You," they were dark sounding songs. You know what I mean, regardless of what they were about, the sound of them were dark- and what I wanted to do was make the sound a little bit brighter, and I think I definitely accomplished that on this album. It's just a little more fun.

Earlier we talked about your past collaborations with Joe and Ghostface. Do you have any collaborations on your newest album?

No actually, on this album I have no collaborations. I went the complete opposite direction with it. It wasn't so much of a plan, but usually when I have done collaborations, it's because I'll have a song done and it fits to have someone else there. But I don't like to force collaborations for the sake of having collaborations and so, I didn't really feel any on this album so I didn't do any.

Now there may be some coming far as remixes and things like that but on the actual album, it's just all me.

So the album's name is The Rose Experience, I thought it was an interesting name. Does it have any particular meaning?

Yea actually, my alter ego is the Black Axel Rose is Blaxl Rose. So a lot of these experiences that I'm singing about are Blaxl Rose experiences, you know what I mean? Blaxl Rose is a little more fun than me, a little wilder. It's like a wilder side, a different side of me. And that's what I wanted to show on this album, which is why I wanted it to sound brighter and a little more playful in some spots.

So how'd you come up with the alter ego Blaxl Rose?

Well actually, where it came from was that I would be out at different events and functions and everybody would be like "You don't act like an R&B singer, you should be a rock star. You act like a cranky ass rock star." And it kinda just went from there. Everybody was like I shoulda been a Guns N Roses and stuff like that. So I just came up with Blaxl Rose, the black Axel Rose. Only thing is I show up for concerts!

Case always has a great time performing and gets into it, inspiring the nickname of Black Axl Rose.

So you mentioned earlier that you're touring for the album. Is it a nationwide tour or is it limited? What's your plan for it?

Nah, it's nationwide. I've been going for about the past month or so. I've been all over. I'm going to California for about a week. I was just in Arizona, I've been in the south, was up in New York a little bit. I'm going back to New York. It's pretty much all over, I was in Minneapolis a couple weeks ago.

Throwing things back to a different time, what made you decide to go independent? What made you create your own independent label with Indigo Blue?

The biggest thing that made me go independent was that I needed more freedom, be it creative freedom making the album, or just the freedom to put the singles out that I feel should be out, and to give it the attention that I feel like it needs. When I have an idea of what the singles should be, I have it for a reason, you know? I feel strongly about it and a lot of times, you can't get away with that at a major label because you have a whole bunch of other people whose jobs are on the line and they have their own opinions, be they right or wrong. That was just something that I wasn't willing to continue to deal with.

Wrapping things up, you're touring now, you've got the album coming out March 24th. Where do you see yourself going from here?

I mean, I'm going to continue to tour, I'm going to get started on another album right away. I'm just going to keep going, there won't be anymore long layoffs like that anymore so nobody has to worry about that. I'm just going to keep working hard.

Alright, well thanks a lot Case. I wish you the best of luck with your upcoming album and I hope everything goes well!

Thank you! Also, I have all the tour updates and new music from the album on my MySpace page, which is myspace.com/theofficialcasemusic.

Keep up to date with Case at Case's MySpace and Case's Twitter.