John D. Luerssen
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John D. Luerssen -- born July 12, 1968 -- is a national music writer who broke into journalism in 1985, when he reviewed The Smiths' Meat Is Murder for his Westfield, New Jersey high school newspaper. As a teenager, Luerssen sang in a band with Dan Yemin, later of Lifetime.
Luerssen attended West Chester University in West Chester, Pennsylvania between 1986 and 1990, where he wrote an alternative music column called "The Vinyl Verdict" for the university's weekly newspaper, The Quad, and hosted his own radio show on WCUR for four years. His first-ever interviews were with Living Colour's Vernon Reid, Tim Burgess of The Charlatans U.K., John Easdale of Dramarama and Tim Booth from James. The first song he ever played on the radio was Squirrel Bait's "Kid Dynamite".
In 1991, after additional forays into journalism, broadcasting and record company employment -- as well as a brief turn as an independent radio promoter -- Luerssen took a job with a New Jersey utility and didn't write a CD Review or an artist feature for eight years.
In 1999, he resuscitated his music-based pursuits as a part time venture, contributing to a number of now-defunct music websites. At the dawn of the 21st Century, he started contributing to the likes of Rolling Stone and Billboard. In 2002, he co-hosted the short-lived "MOUTHING OFF on KROCK" rock talk segment on WXRK-FM in New York with Bill Crandall, now Editor-in-Chief of AOL Music. He has since appeared as an alternative music subject matter expert on KROQ, 91X, KNND, WHFS, Y100, CFNY, WFNX and NPR.
He's written for All Music Guide, Mean Street, American Songwriter and Rockpile among many other outlets. Luerssen is also responsible for two music books, 2004's Rivers' Edge: The Weezer Story (which won a Bronze Award in the Music Book of the year category by Foreword Magazine in June of 2005) and 2002's hard to find Mouthing Off: A Book of Rock & Roll Quotes, which was published by The Telegraph Company.
In addition, John has written dozens of artist and record company bios on behalf of bands like Bad Religion, Marilyn Manson, Pennywise, Dropkick Murphys, Primus, Emilie Simon, Good Charlotte, MxPx, The Almost, Anberlin, Franky Lee, Hawthorne Heights, Emery, Submersed, The Color Fred, Seether, Underøath, Breaking Benjamin and Snow Patrol.
Luerssen has interviewed everyone from Jack Johnson and Yo La Tengo's Ira Kaplan to Fountains of Wayne and Mac McCaughan of Superchunk to Ted Leo and Mark Eitzel, not to mention mainstream acts like Shakira, Babyface, Fall Out Boy, Chamillionaire and System of a Down but counts interviews with Robert Pollard of Guided By Voices, Paul Westerberg, Ryan Adams, Alex Chilton, Miles Hunt of The Wonder Stuff, Mike Peters of The Alarm, Iggy Pop and Joe Strummer as his personal favorites.
In August of 2005, Luerssen was named Music Editor for Musicland's BOOM magazine by Next Galaxy Media. In November 2005, he was also named Music Editor of F.Y.E.'s E360 Magazine. In May 2006, Luerssen started his own music communications firm, Strike-A-Chord, and quickly aligned with Epitaph Records and its imprints ANTI- and Hellcat Records as a communications consultant. Luerssen also works routinely with The Mitch Schneider Organization (MSOPR). In October 2006, John Luerssen was named Music Editor of E360Live, an on-demand web-based music video outlet.
Luerssen occasionally writes a music blog called "Swords of A Thousand Men" (http://luerssen.blogspot.com). Luerssen also wrote the March 2007 Iggy Pop cover story regarding The Stooges comeback, and the July/August 2007 Ryan Adams cover story, both for American Songwriter.
John Luerssen is currently working on a book on the history of "The Howard Stern Show" and has plans for a coffee table book of punk, new wave and alternative music singles released between 1977 and 1987. He hopes to have it completed and published in 2008.
In addition to his writing career, Luerssen lives in Westfield, New Jersey with his family. He also doubles as a Customer Operations Supervisor for PSE&G, where he has worked since 1992 and oversees 50 field and office employees in the company's New Brunswick, N.J. Customer Service Center. Luerssen is also a member of a once-a-month Friday night poker club, and often rides his bike to club gatherings.
