Having CF and living the rock’n’roll lifestyle are two things that you wouldn’t normally associate together. Joe Dexter manages to combine both though as the lead singer and bass guitarist of punk band Orange. In this interview Joe talks us through some of his experiences of life on the road and how he manages to stay as healthy as possible whilst on tour.
Header photo by Jade Till Photography
Martin) Did you know from a very young age that you wanted to be in a band? Did you ever think it wouldn’t be possible because of your CF?
Joe) Growing up I wanted to be an actor or a screenwriter. Me and my best friend at the time would spend all of our free time writing and directing our own movies including an ENTIRE remake of Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone! We kept all the same dialogue and we both played every character in the film. I’d love to put it on YouTube one day. My dad is a musician and plays bass with Sade…you know, the Smooth Operator song? Thats them. He spent most of my childhood, when we weren’t skateboarding or collecting Pokemon cards, trying to get me into music and buying me guitars I would never play! But it wasn’t until I was about 13 when I discovered music for myself that it changed my life. I was watching MTV and Fat Lip by Sum 41 came on. It was love at first sight. A few months later I moved to LA and went to see them live with a few of my friends. We started Orange that very night and never looked back. Within 2 years we had a record with the biggest indie label in the world at the time, Epitaph Records. CF has never stopped me from doing one single thing in my entire life. I can’t imagine what it would be like to be normal. I’ve always had a back bone of steel and ambition to match. It’s a Capricorn thing!
M) Whilst growing up, were your family and friends supportive of your ambitions of being in a band, even though you had CF? And what tips would you have for the loved ones of a young person with CF who wants to be in a band? (i.e. how best can they be supportive)
J) I had nothing but support growing up. I felt limitless and still do to this day. Actually more so than ever! With amazing drugs like Orkambi out there today and more on the horizon there is no reason why we won’t have a legion of CF superstars in the future.
It is 100% vital that you do your breathing treatments religiously though. The best way your friends, family or bandmates can be supportive is making sure you do them. They have to be on the same team as you by educating themselves and not doing anything that could give you an exasperation like smoking or spraying aerosols. Without the upbringing I had in regards to how important treatments are there is no way I would be healthy enough to sing and tour professionally like I do. My dad, being a professional musician, understood my ambition. My mother on the other hand still finds it quite terrifying to this day and would much rather I do something less physical like photography!
M) How do you prepare for a tour to ensure you are fit to perform all the dates?
J) I do my best to live a healthy lifestyle all the time regardless of whether I’m touring, but chocolate keeps getting in the way! Being on stage is all cardio. I train myself to be able to run the entire length of my set on the elliptical before tour begins. You have got to be fighting fit to do this night after night, especially being the lead singer in a punk rock band which calls for a super energetic performance. There’s nothing Billie Joe Armstrong can do that I can’t but it took a lot of training to get there. Ok maybe there are some things like comparing myself to Justin Bieber and calling iHeartRadio a bunch of assholes… but I’ll get there one day!
M) Do you manage to fit in all your healthcare requirements while touring? If so, how do you do it?
J) Our tour bus is a mobile pharmacy, I’m a walking pharmacy, together we’re a match made in rock’n’roll heaven. We kit out the buses each time to be able to host all of my nebulizers and medication. I never miss a treatment. I travel with loads of Cipro, Azithromycin and Prednisone too just incase I take ill on the road which is more often than not. I almost always end up on IV after a tour, especially during the winter months and I’m aware that’s detrimental but I don’t care. This is my dream. I want to die on stage playing the last note of the very last song. Always leave them wanting more as they say in show business.
M) Have you ever been in a situation where you’ve been ill with a concert coming up? How did you handle it?
J) The best story I have so far is from when we were touring America back in 2009. We were in Portland, Oregon and as soon as we finished the first song in the set I immediately started coughing up tons of blood. I don’t just mean a few splatters, I mean handfuls. The entire audience saw this happening before their eyes and needless to say the show, in that case, did not go on. I was rushed to the nearest ER where, of course, they knew nothing about CF.
The next morning the guys came and picked me up from hospital to head back to LA. Within an hour we all had blistering fevers and were coughing our guts out. I was in the back seat delirious, going in and out of consciousness. Every gas station we drove by we would stop at so I could cough out more of the blood that just kept coming. A police officer had the audacity to pull us over, suspicious of all of us wearing surgical masks, and gave us a speeding ticket. We didn’t need a ticket, we needed a damn escort! My drummer Zak was a real hero that day and made the entire 16 hour drive from Portland to LA in just one sitting to get me back to my CF team where I was diagnosed with Swine Flu. Dr Adupa Rao saved my life. My mother remembers seeing me crawl out of the tour bus delirious and coughing horrendously, blood splattering on to the pavement and thinking I was going to die. I was immediately put on IV in complete isolation. Every doctor and nurse had to wear full body protective gear. I felt like E.T! I made a full recovery and was back in rehearsals 2 weeks later. #punkrock
M) Eating well is an important part of keeping healthy with CF – is it possible to do this while on the road? What meals and snacks do you typically eat while touring?
J) And here lies yet another harrowing tale from the road… We were all at an iHop, a small diner chain in the US, recovering from a heavy night when suddenly my blood sugar plummeted so I got my manager to order me a chocolate milkshake. 5 minutes go by, no milkshake, so my manager questions the waitress. 10 minutes go by, still no milkshake. He gets up in a Gordon Ramsay style fit of red faced rage, flames spitting out of his ears and starts power walking around the restaurant screaming “Chef! CHEF?!?” while the waitresses are trying to get him to be seated. “Chef! I NEED A FOOKIN’ MILKSHAKE!” in his northern twang could be heard echoing from behind the kitchen doors as me and the band sat there laughing hysterically… I eventually got my milkshake.
Eating well while touring has never been a problem. The UK and the US are full of truck stops and diners every few miles. I travel with a box rammed with all my favorite chocolate bars and cereal bars for back up and snacks. Hell I’ll even splash out and eat more than usual because I do an hour of hardcore exercise every night on stage. I always come home about 10 pounds lighter.
M) Do you find singing helps your lungs?
J) I’ve always believed so. I get asked a lot by other parents of CF patients what I do to stay healthy and, apart from traditional medication and some eastern practices, the only thing I do differently is sing. I actually know a handful of singers who also have CF like Tess Dunn. Perhaps its a form of autogenic drainage! Maybe if I prove it we can get NHS funded singing lessons for CFers next!
M) Are there any exercises you do that help increase your lung volume (and hence helps your singing)?
J) The way I’ve been taught to breath since I was a kid during singing lessons surely must have had some affect on that. I breath heavily from my diaphragm and belly all of the time. My upper chest rarely moves unless I want it to. I was trained so well by Ron Anderson (voice coach to Alicia Keys, Adam Levine and Haylee Williams) that I’m able to inhale and exhale completely without moving a single muscle by only keeping my diaphragm engaged yet completely still. It’s a really fun party trick!
M) Do you manage to fit in exercise (both while on tour or off tour)? If yes, what exercise? If no, do you find singing is enough of a workout?
J) Absolutely! Now that I’ve spent the last few months in England though my routine has gone out the window, but when I’m stable in LA I go to the gym every other day. I run on the elliptical for 30 minutes to the tempo of whatever song comes on my headphones, then I will do muscle training for another 30. I also drink whey protein shakes post workout. My doctor in LA has a theory that its not fat that denotes a good lung function but actually muscle mass. I’m really interested in that theory and hope it gets looked into further. I need to get back on the bike as they say or, in this case, the stationary bike. Performing on stage is a mega workout in itself so I when Im on the road I don’t do anything but give it my all for those minutes that Im on stage.
M) You’ve mentioned in a previous article that while your bandmates are partying and living the rock’n’roll lifestyle, you’ve had to stay in your room doing your treatments – does this ever get you down? If so, how do you cope with it?
J) Sometimes its bothered me but by nature I’m actually quite insular and happy with my own company. The other guys would be out getting wasted, smoking god knows what and up till the wee hours of the morning after a gig and I’d be in my hotel room watching Chatty Man and doing my treatments. I’ve always been ok with that though. I will do whatever it takes to continue to pursue my rock’n’roll dreams. I’ve seen a lot of people with CF adopt that “live fast, die young” life style and that’s so the wrong attitude to take. CF is not a death sentence but we do have to live within our limitations and with more and more amazing drugs in the pipeline I really believe things will only get better for us CFers – we just need to hang in there and do our absolute best to stay healthy.
M) You also mentioned that you use alternative treatments to help (e.g. Bach flower essences and reiki) – how do these help?
J) My mum has been treating me with alternative therapies since I was a baby. I was lucky that she was always into spirituality and homeopathic medicines. I think it’s absolute insanity to treat yourself with just eastern practices though. You NEED drugs. We mix eastern and western medication/treatments. We use a combination of dowsing, reiki, visualizations, Bach and Australian flower essences, a shit ton of vitamins and supplements like garlic, fish oils, floradix and probiotics to name just a few things. She taught me everything she knows. I’ve lowered my ABPA levels completely using only Bach flower remedies. My doctor in LA asked for the recipe but unfortunately its not as simple as that. Each person is unique and responds to different remedies which is why you need to dowse to find the right combination for you.
I 100% attribute my good health greatly to flower essences and reiki. But seriously, you need the drugs too. They work hand in hand together. We also make what we call “aura sprays” which is a spray bottle filled with purified water, a mixture of Bach or Australian essenses and one drop of tea tree oil. They strengthen my aura and protect me from colds and flus. It sounds bananas but it works!
M) Do you have any other tips for anyone with CF wishing to follow an alternative life path such as yours?
J) In music the highs and lows are extreme. There is no middle ground. I think that goes for all artistic fields. You must have a backbone of steel and resilience to match because there will be times when CF wants to make you throw in the towel. Not only will you have your health telling you no but you will also have people telling you no constantly. This is the business of rejection. I’ve come close to calling it a day and becoming a photographer (much to my mothers approval) a few times but I’m so glad I didn’t give up. Ive had an incredible life, made amazing memories and if I can inspire one fellow CFer to pick up a guitar, Ill have done alright by me.
A huge thank you to Joe for sharing his experience and tips on how to be a punk rocker with CF! You can find out more about Joe through Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or YouTube (which includes his daily vlog). Alternatively, look up his band, Orange, on their Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud or YouTube pages or use the hashtag #vivalaorange
*ALWAYS ENSURE YOU SPEAK WITH YOUR MEDICAL TEAM BEFORE MAKING ANY HEALTH RELATED CHANGES TO YOUR LIFESTYLE*
CyFi Life - Advice on Leading Healthy and Fulfilling Lives from People with CF 