My name is Jason Mundok. I’m an audio producer, podcaster, musician, and songwriter from Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
I am passionate about the creative process of recording audio and have served as a recordist and record producer for my own music and many other artists over the years. As a working musician, my primary instruments have been bass, guitar, keyboards, and vocals.
Since 2010 I have been producing and hosting podcasts and composing music for podcasts and video projects.
ARTIST STATEMENT
My passion is production: the process of building a song from inception, through the iterative creative process, to a completed recording. While I sing and play a variety of instruments, creative fulfillment for me lies in composing and capturing music that is greater than the sum of its parts.
This online portfolio is a growing archive of my original recorded works that date back to the very beginning of the 1990s. The music loosely falls into three categories: ambient|instrumental, art rock|dream pop, and acoustic|Americana. Bouncing between these three categories over the years has allowed me to create a unique body of work that I’m excited to document and archive here as I begin my fourth decade of writing and recording music.
Creating music in a variety of genres has had its drawbacks. This approach made it challenging to present a consistent voice to audiences that may be interested in one style of music, but not another. As a result much of the music was shared for short periods of time, before moving on to different projects and feeling as though the shifting styles could be detrimental to growing an audience for the new work; essentially starting over many times.
On the other hand, my interest in exploring music through a variety of styles and genres has been a gift that has allowed me to express across a wide spectrum of emotion and subject matter. My music, in all of its forms, accurately represents the diverse catalog of music that continues to inspire me to create. The artists who have been my primary source of inspiration, such as Pink Floyd, Peter Gabriel, The Cure, Cocteau Twins, Smashing Pumpkins, Love and Rockets, Radiohead, Bon Iver, and Shearwater, along with producers like Daniel Lanois, Brian Eno, and Butch Vig have all unapologetically criss-crossed genres throughout their careers. I love and respect that about them.
These reflections have inspired me to embrace my full body of work as the whole of what I have created on this fascinating journey. While the music is covers a lot of ground, there are through lines that I hope you can feel, and that I hope to maintain as I continue to make music for many years to come. – Jason Mundok 2022
MUSIC
My personal music catalog is published under the name J Mundok, but my catalog also includes work under the name Jesters Longevity (a studio collaboration with Dave Bellard) and Here Inside (a studio and performing collaboration with Anne Kirby).
PODCASTS
I produce a variety of podcasts for So Good Media. I also publish a personal audio journal sound collage called Erase the Filter and a fun conversational show called The Candy Factory 5BY5 Podcast. An archive of my first podcast Around the Wood Stove is available here.
BIOGRAPHY
My musical journey began in the basements and garages of a small Western PA coal town during the 1980s. My high school pals and I banged out the rock and metal songs of the day at fire hall dances, parties, and school functions. While attending college at Clarion University of Pennsylvania (1989 to 1993) I developed my passion for recording with cassette 4-track recorders, drum machines, digital sequencers, and any instruments I could get my hands on. During that same time, I developed my love of post-punk, college rock, and alternative music and began exploring songwriting with a handful of good friends.
After graduation in 1993, I landed in Nashville, TN where I spent the following six years writing, recording, and performing in studios and on stages both big and small. My tastes expanded through deep dives into the ambient music of the early 1990s, informing the pop and rock music I was writing at the time. I developed a love for experimentation and tried to incorporate more artistic and unusual elements into the music I was recording. During my time in Nashville, I had the privilege of meeting and working with incredibly talented musicians and engineers who afforded me opportunities to make records in state of the art studios and perform on stages all around the eastern US.
After a summer living and performing in Ireland with a New York based rock band, I landed in Lancaster during the fall of 1999 where I have lived ever since. Over the following ten years I had the pleasure of writing and recording several experimental albums with Dave Bellard under the name Jesters Longevity. I also wrote and recorded both art rock and ambient albums under my own name and explored Americana and acoustic based music through my own writing and collaborations with excellent players from around the area. In the mid-teens I started a band called Here Inside, as my primary outlet for art rock and dream pop.
For the past couple of decades here in Central Pennsylvania and the surrounding areas, I’ve had the pleasure of performing everywhere from livings rooms to coffee shops to rock clubs. I’ve played with several bands, produced albums for my own projects and a variety of other local artists, and produced dozens of concerts in both established venues and in found spaces.
Additionally, in 2010 I expanded my love of audio production and began producing podcasts. My first show, Around the Wood Stove (2010-2014), covered Lancaster area performing arts news and feature interviews. Since then I’ve worked on a variety of podcasts, both professionally and personally, conducting interviews, recording found sounds, and composing original theme music. I currently produce Erase the Filter, an audio journal sound collage, and several podcasts for So Good Media in Lancaster, PA.