John Waite performing at The Big E this weekend

WEST SPRINGFIELD, MA (WGGB/WSHM) - Musician John Waite, perhaps best known for his 1984 hit “Missing You,” is performing at The Big E on October 2.

“If you don’t raise the bar and write in a truthful way, it is always just going to be entertainment like arena rock,” Waite told Western Mass News.

Waite explained how his music is often personal by incorporating experiences from his own life that always remain true to who he is.

“It has to be revealing. It just can’t be ‘Let’s all rock tonight.’ There are people who can do that. I think I am an odd component of what is going on these days,” Waite said.

He also finds writing such songs cathartic.

“When tragedy comes along, as it does in all our lives, you can disappear into a gin bottle or quit your life or just turn away, take the road less traveled. You go ‘Aah’ but with music or with writing, you can articulate all these things that would normally drown a person,” Waite noted.

With a music career spanning 40 years, Waite began as lead vocalist for The Baby’s. He then went on to release a solo record in 1984, “No Brakes.” The smash hit “Missing You” on the album earned him a Grammy nomination and reached number one on the Billboard’s Hot 100 Singles. He later fronted the group Bad English and produced another no. 1 hit on the Billboard Hot Singles: “When I See You Smile.”

The band went on to release two more albums before splitting in 1992. Waite said that “Missing You” is about an honest emotion.

“It is about denial and trying to get through. I was married at the time and hadn’t been home for four months. I had gone to America to sign the contract and I arrived and it was love at first sight,” Waite added.

Waite said he has drawn musicial inspiration from artists such as Neal Young, Bob Dylan, and Joni Mitchell. He loves performing the song “Bluebird Café,” which is about a young waitress in Nashville trying to make it in the world. Waite said connecting with fans is one of the things he enjoys most about performing.

“I think the greatest thing in the world for me, for being a writer, is when you take the music out into the public, there are people in the audience looking at you right in the eyes and they have shared the experience with you, sharing your life, and they are sharing theirs being there witnessing what you are saying and it is a really wonderful thing, like a connection that is a profound thing with the audience,” Waite explained.

He hopes fans come away from his concert feeling one thing.

“That it was real, that was it was completely real,” Waite said.

You can CLICK HERE for more information on Waite’s concert at The Big E.

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