22 | QSALTLAKE MAGAZINE | Q&A
Qsaltlake.com |
Issue 302 | JULY 18, 2019
Justin Utley bares his ‘Scars’ in ‘Survivors’ BY ASHLEY HOYLE
The last time Utah’s
own Justin Utley sat down with QSaltLake Magazine was in 2011 and much was different. We check back in with him after eight years to discuss all the music, loss, and growth he’s found in that time. As he prepares to release his newest album, Scars, and its anthem, Survivors, we hear about his inspiration and the hardships that he spun into the resilience of this deeply moving album. Justin began the interview having just hopped off the phone with his collaborators, who had decided to swap out the last song on the album. The electricity in his voice was unmistakable, “It’s such a crazy time right now. It’s fun though; I wouldn’t do it if it weren’t.” Scars is Utley’s fourth studio album and comes off the back of Nothing This Real in 2010, Runaway from 2005, and his first, Simplicity, from 1996. In the throes of creating and touring Runaway, Justin was inspired to leave Utah and head to musical mecca New York City. “In uprooting my life, it was about risk and with that comes the consequences and a lot of things happened that were, all in all, for the better,” said Utley of his time out East. It proved creatively fruitful as Nothing This Real earned him an OutMusic award and a slot performing at Utah Pride. On the success of his last album, Justin says that it “helped really validate what I was hoping to bring to the table musically — it wasn’t something just I enjoyed anymore. That album helped me see that the songs that I was writing had real impacts. As an artist, it has been really important.” The record continued to prove engaging to audiences as it brought Justin on an international tour, mostly in the United Kingdom and Ireland. “I don’t know; sometimes an artist makes a really cool splash somewhere inexplicable — it works for me,” Justin laughed. “I don’t mind going there.” The sweeping success of the album brought him all around the world and landed him surprisingly back in his home state of Utah. As he puts it, “I got to a point in my career in New York that I didn’t have to live there to do what I was doing. All I really needed then was an airport.” Non-musically, his return home was not at all glamorous — he went through a divorce and
