Beats Per Minute (Andrew Halverson): Here’s To Nowhere had this very grounded, specific sound to it, but with the new album you took a lot of big leaps in your sound. What was it like to transition between the two records and what inspired the change on The Coyote?

James Cooley (Mesita): The last album was inspired by a lot of different minimal stuff, that and just trying to make something coherent front-to-back without anything derailing it. The Coyote was inspired by not really knowing what the hell I was doing, so it became less constricted with where it could be taken. When it started, I was aiming for something quiet and subtle, clean sound and lots of space. But I was really limited by my equipment, the sound of the room, and my lack of ability as an audio engineer. It’s hard because I dream of getting these professional sounds out of these same cheap mics, but then reality hits again. I still have no idea what I’m doing. So it became really frustrating. There was a moment where I had to stop trying so hard and get back to having fun with it again. So the synths got fired up and the toy glockenspiel came out, and these songs finally started forming up.

There is definitely a visible direction that came together on The Coyote, the thematic material frequently involving feelings of youth and questioning. Was there something that pushed the record into sounding so post-teenage?

It definitely focused on growing up. This was sort of a way to look back one last time and begin really moving on from it. Some of the ideas are on the album for the main purpose of just getting them out, to now really head in the direction I’ve been wanting to. Especially “Ken Caryl.” It was put up front so that the rest could unravel behind it. Have the brighter tracks to start and grow from them as the album goes along. I’m 24, and too old to be singing like I’m still in high school.

Speaking of “Ken Caryl” being a song of dreamier proportions as opposed to the rest of the album, it’s still a standout among standouts. “Search for Meaning” and “Into the Wind” are pretty different from the norm. How did some of these “surprise” songs that made it on the album sort of come together?

Those tracks came a bit late, after struggling to figure out where they were going and how they fit with the album. “Into The Wind” was originally long and stayed at the same level, but it sounded too much like some of the other tracks and it drained the energy out. When I loosened up and started experimenting with it more again, the ideas separated into the two different halves of the song and it started working as kind of a divider for the album. “Search For Meaning” started as a short little folky acoustic interlude, but I didn’t like it. And then one night I just needed to scream my lungs out in frustration. It wasn’t very thought-out, and I thought while tracking it that it would just end up getting deleted anyway. But it seemed to work, so it stuck.

You took around three years between Cherry Blossoms and Here’s To Nowhere for a full album, while it seems you were able to dip right into The Coyote. Do you think there’s been a heavy progress to how you make music?

I’ve become a little more comfortable with how to record. Each new project brings new challenges and discoveries, a change in recording setup, different inspirations. I write a lot when wrapping up something else, so when each project finishes up, it’s already on to the next. I start to get bored with what’s there but am excited with where it can go. It’s usually near the editing stages when things trip up, just with the songs not sounding right or that desire to head in a completely different direction hitting… That point of trying to connect the initial progress to the gameplan to finish it up and find an ending. So having the weight off to start from a blank slate after the last album, that as well as knowing what pitfalls to expect and how to avoid them this time around have made it a lot easier. I still have a long way to go, but there’s learning with each release. I’m just trying to get better.

By the time The Coyote was released, nearly all the songs on the record were, in some shape or form, available elsewhere, but many of the tracks are noticeably revamped like “Onward Upward” and even “On Through The Dark.” Was this a planned method of yours while making the album?

It’s sort of the way I have to work… It always feels like something else needs to be done to a track if there’s still time to work on it. If not, it feels like time is being wasted. Like it won’t reach where it could have if I had just taken that last bit of time on it. Bad thing is, I can definitely over-cook a track that way. It’s a good way of getting nothing done. It’s when the deadlines need to be placed. That’s why releasing an album or EP is so relieving. When it’s out, it’s done, it’s there, and there’s no going back to it, even if I wanted to. I don’t feel that way about releasing single songs. It feels incomplete. It’s got to be wrapped up in a full work to feel right. It’s going back and forth, making sure all the tracks sounded right playing into each other, that there wasn’t any obvious mistake sticking out that would irritate me every time it played. So the whole album wrapped up at the same point, even if a few tracks had been released earlier. It was sitting there and deciding that I’ve done all that I wanted to do with it. That’s a hard call when you spend so much time and put yourself into it. Just to wake up the next day and have it done, no going back… To sit at a blank screen, think about where to go next, and all you can do is move forward.

You’ve kind of become an entity that’s been popping on several independent music blogs and that’s how a lot of people have latched on thanks to these song release tendencies of yours, and unlike many other artists, you seem to thrive on keeping in contact with fans on Twitter and Facebook on a very personal level. People love that sort of interaction, but how important is it to you and what do you get out of the communication?

It’s very important. I’d be absolutely nowhere without the sites and the people supporting my music. I wouldn’t have been able to make the progress I have made the last few years with both this music and my personal life. To have someone comment on my facebook, I get so psyched about that. Not only having someone listen to this music, but to get the opportunity to thank them for it one-on-one. After all they have allowed me to do, I feel a definite obligation to.

You released your last album not even three weeks ago, but you’ve already been hinting at some new stuff. What can people expect in the near future?

I’m in a whole different mindset… The Coyote had a fall/winter approach to the sound, but summer is coming, things are warming up, the situation’s changing. I have to be careful not to get ahead of myself, though. I was ready to start something new while finishing up the last one. Had a bunch of ideas, started writing new songs, was switching up the recording setup, drum kit into the garage… But it was six months of work straight and I need to catch my breath for a minute. Even if I’m mentally ready to start running again, I don’t want my legs to give out. But definitely more new music soon.

There’s definitely a balance that must be found. If songs from The Coyote were translated into live performances in the state they’re in, it would be one of the biggest-sounding events. Because of limitations, however, you play shows at a minimalist level. Would your upcoming April Sessions be a fair representation for what you would like to achieve in a live atmosphere?

I’ve haven’t figured out the live thing yet, and haven’t been able to for a number of reasons. I have really bad anxiety that stops me from even trying to book shows. Just a really bad feeling that comes preparing for a show and doesn’t leave until a while after. But how do you get better live when you don’t play out? I know not steadily touring is why a lot of labels haven’t given me a shot. And the further I go, the more I don’t want to go that route. If they don’t believe in me now, screw it, I don’t want them. I’ll go it alone. I have for years now. There’s awesome sites and blogs helping out and incredible people listening and supporting me. And I’ll keep going with it. But when it comes to playing out live, I can’t do this alone. And I’m crap at meeting people. It’s why there continues to be so much focus on recording new music, and trying to do as much with what I know. And the session stuff gives me an ability to mess around and work without much pressure, try new things out with a song and not worry about the sound, mess around a bit and have fun with it. It’s a way to give something more for the people that support this music. But with the opportunity to organize a live show how I’d imagine it, it would be a rock show, energy to the roof, loud, full-voice everything. This whole thing started more as a rock project, just got a little side-tracked the last few years. It’s where I’m heading with this music anyway, so it will be a lot easier to bring into a live show. But I can’t do this alone. I don’t want to anymore.

Photo by Philip Cosores

Beats Per Minute (Philip Cosores): Starting off, talk about your earliest musical memories and how you got into music.

Asa Taccone: I was always in jazz band, and singing was sort of mandatory in school. I always danced, as well, which was a big thing while living in the bay. As far as what I listened to while growing up, it was mostly limited to listening to records that my pop would put on. My parents were big hippies, like, my brother is named after the guitar player for Jefferson Airplane and I was named after a D.J., so music was always a big part of my life.

I think the first concert I ever went to was a Grateful Dead show, which is a classic Berkeley first show.

Matthew Compton: My best friend growing up played guitar and we wanted to play in bands, so I learned drums. I grew up in Danville, Virginia, which was a really small town and we didn’t get much exposure at all to music or culture, so I’d always go to Chapel Hill in North Carolina to see shows and stuff. I listened to a lot of music from that area at the time, the Merge Records stuff.

Did you guys move to L.A. to pursue music or is that something that sort of happened after you got here?

MC: Yeah, we both moved here to pursue music.

And, talk about how you met. I heard it involved some house where you guys would hear each other play or something?

AT: We both lived in communal, artsy houses, classic East-side shit. And, in both houses, it was sort of a revolving door of who lived there. And he would come over to play with this other composer who lived downstairs from me and had this nicer studio. And, I think we just got introduced, he heard me writing my little songs and started coming over to play with me whenever I needed it. So, we just started playing together on more and more things and I started to get this body of songs, and eventually we got officially linked.

How long ago was this?

AT: Six years ago.

Wow, that’s a long time to just be releasing a first album.

AT: I mean, I still easily have about a hundred songs written. And, part of it was the time from when Brian (Burton aka Danger Mouse) asked me to do the album, it was about two years until we actually go around to doing it, before he had the time to actually get in the studio.

So, did you guys plan on waiting around for him to produce it?

AT: After he asked, yeah. -laughter-

MC: And he would check in from time to time. It wasn’t, like, a ‘see you in two years’ kind of deal.

AT: Yeah, we’re friends with him so we’d see him all the time, but he wouldn’t be in the States for long enough to have the time to work on it.

So, the album, Mondo, is coming out on April 24th. How much to you think the final project is indebted to Danger Mouse as a producer?

AT: I can’t undervalue him in the slightest. I think the biggest thing that he added to this album is his faith in the hypothetical, meaning that when you are on your third day of working on a song for fifteen hours a day and you are totally lost, he has this total faith in where to go, even if you have no idea.

He asked us if we even wanted him to put his name on it. And, its understandable, because his name is so big. But, I’d say that 60-70% of the album is stuff that was already there and the rest were elements that he enhanced.

I’m sure at this point that you realize that every interview you give, you are going to be asked about working with him. I’m sure part of you would like to have received this attention solely on your own merits, but still you can’t discount the doors that having Danger Mouse involved has opened and how lucky you are.

AT: Yeah, for us it’s more of the latter. We realize how lucky we are and, for us, there is no bad part of it. He’s been so good to us and has been totally there for us anytime we have questions about our live show or if something doesn’t work or he’ll just come to our practice. He’s a cool friend to have.

I read that you guys both have production experience with your bother (Jorm Taccone) in The Lonely Island. What have you taken from working with that project on the production level that has helped your growth or direction as artists?

AT: Probably the social dynamic. For so many years, I was alone in my room working on music and it’s a whole different thing working with human beings and sharing ideas and having everyone put their own input and stamp on it.

MC: Also, it’s one of those job where it has to be done immediately, because it either has to go on the air tomorrow or it could be for something else, but it has to get done very fast. And, it’s kind of nice to work in that environment every now and then, when you’ve been working on the same idea for months and now here is this other project where they have an idea and need to get it out right now.

AT: Yeah, you can’t be overly analytical.

MC: It’s nice, it keeps things fresh.

Looking at your itinerary, as this interview won’t be published til close to the album’s release, you guys have a European tour coming up and SXSW and Sasquatch. You said you’ve been working together for six years, but do you ever feel like you are moving fast, with these big time gigs scheduled?

AT: I mean, I’ve never done this before, in terms of singing on stage and touring, so I have no idea what is ‘fast,’ but people tell me it is pretty good. I have no basis for comparison, but it sounds fun.

MC: I agree, I’m just excited to actually be doing this now. We’ve been waiting for a while.

Right now in February, you are playing these residency dates at the Echo in L.A. And, it’s sort of a rite of passage for many local bands as they make the leap to becoming national acts. Recently, Local Natives and Foster The People went from playing a residency to playing giant venues in no time. Do you guys consider yourself an L.A. band in that sense, since you both moved here from other places?

AT: I think we are part of the scene here.

MC: Yeah, I identify with the scene, for sure.

AT: But, yeah, I still don’t really think of myself as an L.A. person, just because I love my hometown so much.

Yeah, I just get this sense that right now you are still an area, local band. But, you seem like you will very quickly become a national band.

AT: Hopefully.

Yeah, all I’m saying is that most bands playing residencies at the Echo aren’t playing Sasquatch in a couple of months. That’s a big leap. Do you feel pressure when you think in terms like that.

AT: Yeah, yeah. I think so. But, I try to constantly remind myself in my personal life no to put too much pressure on myself. Just to go out there and have fun.

MC: Yeah, eliminate fear.

AT: That’s what we are about, eliminating fear.

So, 2012 is kind of a key year for you guys. You can see the progression, as you get ready to release the debut album and then will tour it.

AT: Plus, it’s the end of the world.

Yes, and that. Assuming the world is still here at the end of the year, where do you guys see yourself at the end of 2012 and what would you consider a successful year.

AT: I hope we are incredibly wealthy and doubly as attractive. -laughter- But, yeah, it’s kind of crazy, because the days keep getting more compacted for the both of us, so there really is less opportunity to think about the future. I have to stick with just what I have to do on a certain day. But, who knows where we will be. Our dream is to just keep making music.

Beats Per Minute (Rob Hakimian): I’m guessing this has been your first question from everyone, but what’s the story behind the album title Milk Famous?

White Rabbits (Stephen Patterson): Ummmmmmmmmm… there isn’t one, there’s no story. It was a combination of two words that we thought worked really well together, and that’s how it came about; we just ended up deciding that we liked it. After we sat with title for a while, y’know, you try to find meaning in these things. It’s kind of how it is with lyrics for me too, I kind of write it in the moment and I hear it back and I dunno, it sounds good to me, I don’t know what it means yet but it sounds good, we’ll keep it. It was a lot like that. I have my own sort of interpretations for what it means, but, yeah, they’re numerous. We wrote a song that’s going to be a b-side that’s called “Milk Famous.” We wrote it after we finished the album, and I had never really done this before but I wanted to record vocals for a song that were in an entirely different character, I always tried to do that but I could never pull it off. So that track, that actually explains a lot of the meaning behind the title to me, the lyrics in that song. So if you’re looking for that, I think the meaning of the lyrics can also be a character if you want it to be.

When do you think we’ll get to hear that song?

Hopefully soon, I wanted to put it out two months ago. Actually, we’re getting it mastered soon so I’m going to fight for it to be out within the first two weeks of the record coming out. I think it’s the best thing I’ve ever done, and it’s a b-side.

Are you going to try to play it live?

Oh, that would be impossible. –laughs-

That makes it sound even more interesting…

Yeah, yeah, you’ll understand why once you hear it. I wish we could but we would need… yeah… you’ll hear it… -laughs- It’s tough to explain.

So all of you guys agreed that the words ‘milk famous’ worked well together? You must be sharing a very similar brain space…

It took us a while for everybody to agree to be in that brain space. A couple of us were like immediately “that is the title! No doubt, that is the title!” and a couple of the guys were not so onboard with it but they came around.

Your last two album covers have been very dark whereas for this one you’ve gone bright pink, is that representative of anything?

Yeah, to me… for lack of a better term it’s a much more colorful record; it sounds more colorful to me, it sounds brighter to me, it sounds more energetic and playful than anything we’ve done before. And, nobody likes… especially us, whatever we’ve done before, we want to do the exact opposite next. -laughs- And that went with the album artwork as well.

Is that the reason behind changing producer as well?

Um, no. I only say that for a few select things that work in that point’s favor. We worked with Mike McCarthy – he mixed It’s Frightening – and we did a little bit of last minute tracking with him on that record. We actually talked to make before It’s Frightening, when we were talking to people about producing the record. And Mike’s a really funny guy, I love him to death, he’s a dear friend of mine, but he makes some of the worst first impressions of anybody I’ve ever met. He flew out to LA and I remember sitting backstage – this while we were touring on Fort Nightly – he was sitting backstage with us in LA, being so quiet and awkward. I’m playing guitar and warming up and he keeps telling me “come on, play me some hot licks man, come on, play me some hot licks!” And I just have no idea who the fuck this guy is, so I’m just thinking he’s some hot shot producer. Anyway, he had a very horrible first impression on us, so we decided not to work with him on It’s Frightening, but after we got into the studio working with him on mixing that record it was clear we wanted to work with him on the next one. He’s phenomenal engineer, first and foremost, and it was also apparent that he approached recording music in a totally different way than a lot of us do; he does much more like a big picture thing, as most producers do, which is why they produce, but he has a much more spiritual approach to recording , he’ll just sit and not really pay attention to where the levels are – you know the levels of the track or whatever, or whatever gear we’re using – he’s able to turn off that technical side very easily and just sit back and let the music come over him, as silly as that sounds, and just responds to it in a very broad, vague way. That was very difficult at first, but once we figured out how to interpret what he was telling us it was like oh we should probably change this section, or work on that part a bit more, or that’s why that’s not working… he’d say things like “it makes me feel like crawling into a hole and not talking to anyone,” “that’s bad dark,” or “this is too bright” – I don’t know, I can’t remember specific examples. But, it was good to be working with somebody that was so different from us. Chris Zane and Britt [Daniel], it was great fun working with both of them, but I’d say we are a lot closer in personality to those guys than we were to Mike, so that was a challenge, but I think that’s the way we should continue to go.

That sounds like a pretty ideal way to make music like yours… I don’t really know what I mean, but…

It’s good because there’s generally like five of us in the recording studio at the same time and we’ve been friends for a really long time, we’ve pretty much become this like, single… you know, you spend that much time with the same people, we all end up with the same sense of humor and we can all finish each other’s sentences and all that stupid stuff. So there’s enough of those kind of personalities in the room, it was nice to have somebody we could not really relate to in any way whatsoever, but we trusted that we knew what he was doing.

So tell me basically about the writing of the album; how long did it take? Do you and Greg split writing duties?

It kind of varies from song to song; some songs on this record were borne out of really late night jams, that got a good sort of beat and progression, and then I would go home and write vocals over it. Other songs we’d start with me and Alex coming up with something together and we’d bring it to the band and we’d flesh it out as a full band. It varies from song to song.

We spent a long time writing this record. We started while we were on tour with It’s Frightening, which ravaged us to our very, very core…

You toured that for a long time didn’t you?

Yeah, it was over a year and a half. It was great fun but you lose a lot of sleep and you go crazy, y’know? Similar things happened when we got off the road with Fort Nightly; we just went right back into the recording studio and it was a very hectic, stressful, instense time and we were losing our minds. I think you can hear that in that record [It’s Frightening] and I think that’s one of the record’s charms.

But I don’t think we could have survived if we had done the same thing again. We knew that we wanted to take our time after we got off the road, so we spent about a year writing and demoing stuff. We went out on a couple of tours during that time just to road test some of the material, which we had never attempted before. Then we moved down to Austin for a few months. We lived in a house down there for three months, in a very suburban sort of neighborhood with a front yard and a back yard with patio furniture and all that, which was awesome; it was like our childhood or something. We had a garage there that we could jam in when we got home from the studio. Unlike New York you’re not living on top of people so you can make a lot of noise at all hours. So we had time to come up with the basic framework of a song and then just try it out 20 different ways until we found one that was really sticking, which is the way to do it and I think that’s the way a lot of bands do it, but we’ve never really had the time to try that many things out before, we just commit to the final recording .

Did road testing the material help you figure out where you wanted to go with the sound? Has it changed much since then?

Yeah, totally. That song, it’s the second to last song “The Day You Won The War,” we had probably played that on the road for a year and a half or something; that was one of the first songs we took out and it’s a really tricky one, there’s a lot of weird twists and turns and weird rhythms and things like that. It wasn’t an easy song, and if we hadn’t gotten so comfortable with all these odd things it really would have ended up sounding like a math rock disaster. You would hear how complex it was, and that’s never the goal; in the end it sounds like how we were playing it, which is just really comfortable and a song that we all love to play. Before when we were recording a song it was just like our first shot at it and we were still figuring it out.

But we only ended up recording a few songs that we had taken out and gotten comfortable with. A lot of it, since we were down there for a few months, I would sit in the garage the night before, work on a song then bring it in the next day and we’d try it out. Sometimes it would really fail and other times it would really work out. The last song on the record, “I Had It Coming,” was a song that we wrote the night before and took to the studio the next day. It ended up being one of my favorite tracks on the record, I think it’s one of the greatest things we’ve done. So sometimes it’s good not to have any idea what you’re going into and other times it helps having a little bit of knowledge going into it.

Are you ever disappointed when some of the songs you take to the band don’t work out?

Yeah! You know, that’s like… it’s money in the bank! –laughs- And it’s gone, y’know? You get attached to these little things, but to a fault I get overly enthusiastic about these things the moment I record it like “fuck yeah this is the best! Yes this is the next thing!” And then I’ll listen to it a week later and it’s total crap. I just need to have a little time and space from it in order to get a sense of what’s really going on.

You said you don’t really know what your lyrics are about…?

I mean, for me it’s like I just go into a dark room and yell a bunch of stuff until I find things that I think are sounding good and then whittle it down so when I listen back I’m like “yeah that feels right, that feels good.” I’m too impatient; I can’t just sit down with a pen and paper and think “I want to write a song about this topic, here I go!” I just can’t do it like that, it has to be kind of like playing an instrument, playing drums, you just sit down and you play for however long. But usually what happens is that a week later I’ll be like “oh shit, that song was about that!” It has a therapeutic sort of element to it.

I was in a nine-year relationship and touring on It’s Frightening totally destroyed that. It’s since worked out, but it was like a two year stretch of time when I had no idea what I was doing anymore. So I think a lot of it, I’ve realized since, has been about that. Whereas It’s Frightening seemed to be an expression of us really losing our minds , this one is also an expression of us losing our minds but not in a way that needed to be expressed in this, like, aggressive, gotta-get-it-outta-me-as-fast-as-possible, freaking out and I wanna scream kind of thing; this is more like looking back on something than freaking out about the future.

Interesting. I wanted to ask, how come the song “It’s Frightening” ended up on this record and not the last one?

Oh because it wasn’t written yet.

You have a tendency of doing that! Writing the title track after the album’s done…

Yeah it’s more fun that way! Hindsight is 20/20!

With your last couple of albums you garnered a lot of comparisons to other bands; does that annoy you? Do you wish you’d just be talked about on your own terms and do you think you’ll get that with this album?

I think you answered the question; I don’t know who on this Earth would not want to be considered on their own terms. That stuff is the product of a certain type of listener and a certain type of listening and a certain way of viewing music as a whole. I think everybody does it, music can be hard to verbalize, it’s easier to explain to somebody what something sounds like based on something that they already know. And that’s frustrating because it’s like, to me, a thing that people do to make themselves feel more comfortable with what’s going on, because they can understand it in these certain terms, but if you don’t understand it and you can’t express it in another way then that’s bad. And… whatever… it used to get to me, it doesn’t get to me anymore. I just turned 30, I don’t give a fuck. –laughs-

You obviously give a lot of attention to detail in your songs, but once they’re all done how much more attention do you put into the tracklist and the packaging and stuff like that?

That’s the fun stuff, the sequencing and putting a visual element to it. I get way into it. This record was really difficult to sequence. It took like two months to figure out how to put it together. Many times we were thinking “shit we just spent nearly two years and now we’re at the point where we’re trying to put it together and it’s not working, what do we do?!” We approached It’s Frightening from … we wrote it in sequence like, “this is the kind of song we want to have happen at this point,” it was a very premeditated sort of approach and I think that was cool actually, it was an interesting way of writing. Like, “I want a track 5 that feels like this,” you know? It kind of makes the process less overwhelming or something, but it was totally the opposite this time, we were just doing whatever sounded good… in the moment, knowing that it’ll come together later.

Everybody works hard on their records; we spent a lot of time making sure that it’s good.

Since you finished the track list have you looked back and though “damn, I wish we did that instead,” or have you made your peace with it now?

Oh I’ve totally made my peace with it; I’ve had more than enough time to sit with this record and decide if this needs to change or that needs to change or whatever. If it wasn’t at a point by now where we were happy with it then I’d be pissed, because this took two years to make. I’m really happy with how it’s turned out, it’s the best thing we’ve ever done.

Are you looking forward to going out on tour? Which songs are you most looking forward to playing?

Um, “Hold It To The Fire” is coming together really nicely live, “I Had It Coming” is the most enjoyable song for me to sing live that I’ve ever written, and “Heavy Metal” is totally new territory for us to perform live so it’s been tricky, but we finally figured it out so that’ll be really… I don’t know, we’ll see how it fits; it turned out good though. But, “Danny Come Inside” is my favorite song to play right now.

Have you got all 11 songs from the album prepared and ready to play?

We have 10 of 11 figured out right now, but we’re going to try and do some new stuff too so we’ll make up for that one track.

Since you’ve got new stuff do you hope to get back into the studio quicker than you did between these last two albums?

Yeah, absolutely. I think we worked really hard on figuring out how to record ourselves this time around, so it doesn’t have to be this big ordeal next time we want to go record something or go into a studio; we can get a good head start on our own. The way I’d love to do it is whenever we’re off the road just go to a studio for five days, record some stuff, go on the road again or do nothing for a while, and then go back. It’d be nice to have it be spread out and just try to amass as many little things as possible. I would just like to release music at a faster rate than we have in the past.

Yeah, that’s cool, but when was the last time you took a vacation?!

I don’t know… -laughs-

White Rabbits’ third album, Milk Famous, is out now on TBD Records. Read our review.

Beats Per Minute (Philip Cosores): On your first two albums, there wasn’t necessarily anything lacking in the production or fidelity, but you can hear a real difference on The Clearing. What were some of the changes that went into the making of the album that allowed you to achieve a grander sound?

Bowerbirds (Philip Moore): It was a number of things. We first started recording it at April Base Studios with Brian Joseph, and all the tracks that remain from that recording sound crystal clear. A lot of the stuff that made the album is from those sessions.

But, not only that. I think that Brian set the bar higher and I learned a lot from watching Brian record. So, when we came home to do vocals and some overdubs, and even start some songs fresh, we had a better idea of how to take our time with it and look for the right sound, instead of just barreling through.

I also think it’s that we had so much more time, like, several months more that we thought we were going to have originally, that we could put the extra time and thought into what we thought the instrumentation was going to be on the album. So, strings obviously bolster things and make the sound more majestic, and we added horns and reed instruments. I think having the extra time to make all those decisions really helps the grandeur of the album.

You mentioned taking a lot more time. Did you ever get worried that you might overwork things or over-think things?

Yes, absolutely. And, I think in the end we got it right. Like, “Brave World” we recorded in four different styles. One was like swing, one was slow, one was super fast and more aggressive. So, yeah, there was a point where we were questioning everything we were doing, but we just took time and put everything down of a month and came back to it. Everything then sounded fresh again and we were able to make decisions about what version of songs sounded the best.

Yeah, and one of the charms I have always found in Bowerbirds, at least with the first two albums, is that it is music you can imagine listening to on a porch, and this album takes it to the next level, but it doesn’t lose that charm. And, I think that is a really delicate balancing act, expanding the sound but still keeping the band sounding true to who they are.

Well, that’s really, really good to hear. That was our intention and it’s really cool that you think that.

“Tuck The Darkness In”

When the album was announced, the press release had some tidbits about the major overarching stories that were happening while you were recording the album. I thought it might be good if you could expand on them for us. So, tell us about Beth’s illness that happened.

It was a year and a little bit ago, right after Thanksgiving, and she fell ill with this mystery illness. She had some sort of infection and couldn’t eat and we finally took her to the doctor and they gave her an i.v. to get her rehydrated. And, we ended up going to emergency twice in a couple days and they couldn’t figure it out. So, we went home and everything seemed to be getting a little better, but still not great. So, we went to another doctor and they told us that she needed to be rushed to the hospital and we did that in a panic. She ended up staying in an emergency room for three days after that. Her iron levels were dangerously low. So yeah, they monitored her for a few days and started feeding her foods with high iron. We started eating lots of steak, liver, things like that. She got better eventually and now she is in really great health, but it was a pretty scary time for us.

Another story that was alluded to was about you guys finding a dog?

-laughs- Yeah. Our second dog, Spice, was our neighbor dog, and she used to hate us and would chase our car nearly everyday. And one day she ran under the wheel-well and Beth ran over her back leg and broke it. So, we took her to the vet and fixed her up and gave her lots of attention, so now she sort of lives with us and our neighbors are cool with it. -laughter- She’s our dog now.

Also, if it isn’t too difficult to talk about, I heard the two of you also had problems with your personal relationship, which I imagine happens for every band that is also a couple, because you spend so much time together.

Yeah, it is the hardest thing to be both in a romantic relationship and to be working in any capacity together. And, I don’t know why Beth and I insist on doing it. Before this, we did web design together. We learned how to program and did stuff like that. We had our own business together. And then we started building our home together just the two of us, which we worked on every single day for several years. And then we started a band the two of us. I think we are getting pretty good at figuring out our boundaries in all of these scenarios, but regardless, when pressure builds, like right now with the release of this record, it gets harder to, like, stop and take a walk and talk about something entirely different. So, it’s really important that we do stop sometimes and walk our dogs and try to be normal for a while.

Do you guys have activities that you like to do by yourselves to give yourselves the break from doing everything together?

Yeah. Beth has her art that she does by herself. She has been learning how to, what do you call it, tan… buckskin… deer hide? Yeah, and she reads a ton of books. I like to run and exercise and work on programming our website and stuff like that.

One of the things I would say about your records is that it reflects the environment that you guys hold. Like, you mentioned that you built this cabin in North Carolina together. And, I think the sound of your music reflects that place. And with this album you have expanded your sound quite a bit, have you ever considered writing in a city to see what that would do for your sound?

Yeah, I would be really curious about that, to see if that would effect what the songs are about. I mean, I used to write songs when I lived in a city, but it was really hard for me to find inspiration in really populated places. I don’t know if it is that I have a short attention span and need a ton of quiet and solitude to focus on expressing what I think in a song or if it more that the actual nature is inspiring to the song.

But, the way that I live my life, I don’t think I could live in a place like New York City for more than a month. I think I’d go crazy. I like to step outside and be able to go straight into the woods. And, I’ve always kind of lived like that. Growing up in Iowa I lived in a house where I could walk out and go straight into the cornfields and be by myself. That is in important part of life, I think.

“In The Yard”

And when you go out on tour, you have to leave that comfort zone behind for a long time. Does it take a serious adjustment for your lifestyle to get back on the road? Also what do you miss the most when you are on tour and what do you like the most about it, because there has to be somethings you enjoy about it or else you wouldn’t do it?

Going out on tour is really exciting. It’s like a vacation or a getaway. I mean, it’s a lot of work at the same time, but seeing all the different people and places and being able to wake up in a different city every day, is definitely exciting for a while. It’s something that as a kid, I loved the idea of adventuring, but I couldn’t really do it. I couldn’t really afford to do it because you had to keep a job and stuff. But, now, this is a really nice job to have, and we get to have fun and adventure and explore new places.

Right now, we haven’t toured in earnest for a couple of years and are really itching to get back on the road. However, we’ve been on tour before for months and know that feeling that you get, even after just a couple of weeks, of wanting that personal space and your own bed, with nothing to do in the morning and no driving to do. But, whatever, it’s just the way it is. It’s still fun, but, you know, I’ll miss my dogs. Luckily, Beth and I go on tour together and I don’t have to miss Beth.

When you play a show, how do you know that you’ve done your job well or had a successful gig?

It’s mostly all audience connection. If you are putting out your best energy, not even if you are playing the best (although that is even better), but you are putting all this positive energy out to the audience and they are getting it, you can feel it. It’s like a visceral thing. The audience can feel it and you can feel it. There is no question when it is good.

I read a recent interview with you where you named some of what you guys have been listening to recently, some of which made sense to me, like The Rosebuds who are from your same area, or Midtown Dickens who I like a good amount. And then there is Skrillex, which I guess is a case of sometimes artists liking to listen to music that is way different than what they write. Is that something you enjoy, listening to music that is a big contrast to what you make?

Yes. I’ve really been into dance music. Not dance dance music, but, and this will date us a little bit, but we were kind of ravers a little bit. In college, I was into trip-hop and things like that. I listened to Archers Of Loaf and Superchunk, but I also was into Portishead and Tricky and Massive Attack and bands like that. So, the whole dubstep thing reminds me a lot of jungle that we listened to back in the day. And, with Skrillex, I guess it shows that we don’t pay attention very well, but it was brand new and we didn’t know it was popular or whatever. But, it was totally awesome. We heard it and like as soon as that beat drops we were like “wow.” I dunno. Kids like it, I guess.

So, I usually conclude my interviews with a similar question, where I ask artists about their idea of success or ask what they hope to accomplish by this release, but for you and your band, and this might be presumptuous, but you seem to be in a really good place. Like, I imagine you think your life is pretty successful at this point. But, what do you do you hope is the end result of releasing The Clearing?

That’s a really good question and I definitely don’t have a straight answer for that. It’s such a weird thing to put your creative product out into the world, or put your creative world out there as a product. In my heart, I just want people to like it, to get it. That’s the only reason that I’ve ever played music. I want to put something out there that people have never heard before. And, I want them to understand what it is that I am trying to say. That’s really as far as any artist can really predict and that is success. If people get it, than all the other pieces will fall into place.

There is no monetary goal and no album sales goal for us at all. You can’t control that anyway. You can only write what you write, and I don’t really want to compromise that for what I think people are more likely to consume. This is mostly for us, for Beth and I to do something creative and fun. I feel like already we are at the point where we can afford to go out on tour and at least scrape by and not have to have jobs in the meantime as we write a record, and that is success to me.

Beats Per Minute (Corinne Bagish): Tell us about working with recording great Steve Albini on Ugly. After years of DIY and self-release roots, what did working with the best of the best mean to you?

Mike: If I had known that recording with Steve Albini meant that that’s all anyone would want to talk about then I would have considered recording elsewhere.

Jarrett: Working with Steve was as good as I could have imaged. There were no magical moments. Steve had almost no input. He just setup the mics well, choose good mic amps and effects, and did a damn good job editing. He was really professional.

Marissa, you’ve mentioned before in interviews that you have yet to find a good recording setup… that too many pedals overwhelm you. Did you finally strike the perfect balance on Ugly?

Marissa: I just bought a new amplifier and it turned out sounding pretty good. I’ve been using the same distortion pedals for a few years now so I suppose that I’m bound to them for the long haul. I’m not sure if too many pedals could ever overwhelm me during the recording process, I am quite fond of them, but I try to keep it to a bare minimum whilst playing live.

Tell us one really weird or funny thing that happened during the recording process.

Jarrett: A lady came to take pictures of us for a blog. We were setting up mics on the piano to try one part in one song while she was there. So almost all the photos from the “in the studio” pictures are of that piano and Marissa playing piano. We didn’t like the piano part so there is absolutely no piano on the record.

You just wrapped up a free record store tour. How did it go? Did you pare down your sound in these smaller, quieter venues?

Jarrett: The record store tour was great. In our current time bands, labels, publicists, etc. seem obsessed with how acts are represented on the internet. If a band doesn’t get a lot of internet coverage, a lot of people act as though you don’t exist. A lot of artists that don’t get a lot of internet coverage feel like they don’t exist or have failed. It is an scary fulfillment of Guy Debord’s Society of the Spectacle. We’ve never found the internet to really be an accurate measure of a band’s success or influence and definitely not of their contribution. Bringing the first single of our new album, in a physical format, to real people, face to face, in real record stores felt like the opposite of Debord’s “Spectacle.” In other words it felt real, and it was real.

Marissa, you’ve been known to design Screaming Females album art. Is the wonderfully odd dragon-like creature on the front of your new album your creation? How did you conceptualize the cover art?

Marissa: Well, I had been getting really into appropriating symbolic imagery and manipulating their meaning and/or mutilating their sanctity, (as you would with an upside-down cross, for example). I wanted to make a symbol for our band, so I sketched up this tiny emblem containing a Basilisk, which is a mythical creature that I learned a bit about while we were in Basil, Switzerland (obviously). It led me on a real kick, I soon found myself reading up on demon classification and sketching up all sorts of my own monsters (this is nearly Dungeons and Dragons territory, mind you). I was also emulating one of my favorite pieces of art ever, “Saint Anthony Tortured by Demons” by MartinSchongauer. I love his etchings.

And now, for some obligatory NJ questions. NJ tends to get lumped in with/overshadowed by NYC in many different contexts. Similarly, the NY and NJ music scenes often get lumped into one. What do you find the main difference between the two to be nowadays?

Jarrett: The NJ scene is small enough to actually be able to talk about a scene. Music in NYC is much too big to discuss a real scene. I’m guessing it will always be this way.

Screaming Females developed a totally unique sound during the mid 2000s when it seemed like the majority of the NJ music scene was immersed in emo/screamo. Take your recent tour mate, Thursday, for example. Did this have any effect on your development as a band? Your fan base?

Marissa: I don’t really remember there being a strong “emo” presence in New Brunswick while we were starting out in 2005. It seemed like a much more popular genre while I was still in high school.

Jarrett, we noticed you are a Troll 2 fan. What other ridiculous(ly amazing) films do you suggest we check out?

Jarrett: Well everyone should obviously check out Best Worst Movie, the documentary on Troll 2. Marissa has been real into the Hellraiser movies lately. Those could easily be categorized as ridiculous. Manos: The Hands of Fate gets my vote for worst movie ever. Watch it with the Mystery Science Theater commentary, there is a much better chance you will actually finish it that way.

Screaming Females’ new album Ugly comes out through Don Givanni Records on April 3rd.

BPM’s Henry Hauser chats with Delta Spirit founding member and bassist Jon Jameson about his band’s upcoming album, giving away free tunes, and the feeling right at home on the road.

BPM (Henry Hauser): On Delta Spirit’s new self-titled LP, you set out to affirm your status as a “modern rock band.” But since all art must build on or against the past to some degree, do you really see a bright line separating modern from classic rock?

Delta Spirit (Jon Jameson): I don’t think we’re doing anything we weren’t trying to do before, but we are letting people know that we’re not in love with the past or trying to mirror it. True, the past makes you who you are, but you also want to move forward and do something that’s new and exciting.

We wanted to get the message out that we are what we are. Some of that has to do with old music, as we’re all made from what happened in the past. But Delta Spirit is also intertwined with the sound and culture of today.

To help shed that myopic “rootsy Americana” label with which some critics have pigeonholed your band, you’ve enlisted Chris Coady [TV on the Radio, Beach House, and Smith Westerns] to produce Delta Spirit. How did having this new presence in the studio change your creative process?

In the places we are more unfamiliar, like synth sounds, he contributed an understanding of a world we knew very little about. On our first LP we had little to no understanding of recording. On this album, though we didn’t go into a fancy Los Angeles studio or anything, we did have a superb sound engineer that really understands sonics. He integrated a lot of techniques that were new to us, like using very close mics on the drums. It was really cool to see how the songs came out.

Despite your reputation as road warriors, Delta Spirit touts its involvement with a community of other musicians hatching all kinds of tunes. Can you turn us onto a few of those groups?

We’re about to go on tour with Waters. About four years ago, we did our first headlining tour with them and played some pretty brutal shows in front of about half a dozen people. Port O’Brien and We Barbarians are two great groups that I’d also highlight. On the back end of our tour we’ll be playing with Tijuana Panthers, a fantastic surf-punk band out of LA.

We’re also really grateful that bands like Cold War Kids, Dr. Dog, and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah took us out on tour when we were just getting started. It’s great that now we can give other bands that chance.

I think I’ve Found It, Delta Spirit’s rambunctious, socially conscious, youthfully exuberant debut EP, is now available online free of charge. Cultivating some karma, atoning for a few sins, or just shaking things up?

Well, it’s the only music that we completely own ourselves, which is liberating. We can do anything we want with it! I think I’ve Found It has different sounding songs than our two LPs. We’re trying to remind people of our old stuff because I think Delta Spirit makes a little more sense in terms of the whole life and progression of our band.

Spring’s around the corner. I usually get in the mood by spinning George Harrison’s “Here Comes the Sun” and Small Faces’ “Itchkcoo Park.” Have you got any favorite springtime cuts?

It’s funny because all of us are originally from California. We lived in a perpetual spring/summer our whole lives, but in the last six months we’ve all moved to Brooklyn. It’s been a relatively mild winter, but it still makes spring more exciting, which is cool for a Californian. I love New Order’s “Age of Consent” off Power, Corruption & Lies – it’s dark in parts but also bright.

A couple of months back, Delta Sprit dropped a raw, scathing cover of Zombies’ “She’s Not There” totally out of the blue – where’d that come from?

To be honest, we did it for a TV competition and got beat out by Neko Case and Nick Cave. We just recorded it in a band member’s basement, thought it sounded great, and figured put it out there. Wouldn’t want it to go to waste.

You’ve been off the road for over 6 months now, which is a long time for you guys. What excites you about going on tour?

It’s been a weird time. We recorded our new album in upstate New York near Woodstock last year, and about a month later members of the band gradually started moving to Brooklyn. It was a long layoff, so I took a part time job working in a chocolate factory.

We’re definitely ready to get back to where we feel most at home, which is playing gigs on the road. Once you get to the point of playing songs live, it’s time to flush them out and bring the whole crowd into it. It’s my favorite past about being in a band.

All photos by Philip Cosores

Beats Per Minute (Ace Ubas): First of all, I want to congratulate you on the release of your latest album Remembrance of Things to Come.

Matt: Thank you very much.

You’ve done a few residencies in your past. What’s your favorite part of doing residencies?

Matt: What I like about it is that we don’t have to drive anywhere. This is maybe the best one though because it’s so close to my house.

You moved from Santa Monica to Eagle Rock, right?

Matt: Yeah. But now I live in Echo Park and Jesse lives in Silver Lake. I literally live three minutes from here. It’s all about convenience.

If you could have a residency anywhere, where would it be?

Matt: Staples Center -laughs-

Ben: I think we would do Wembley Stadium.

Matt: That’s like the Oasis residency. Arctic Monkeys did a bunch of shows there.

Ben: We could do the whole Michael Jackson thing he never ended up doing, like 60 dates in the O2 arena.

What were you listening to while writing the new album that provided some creative inspiration?

Matt: I was listening to a lot of Steve Reich’s music. The minimalist composers I was intrigued by, like, Terry Riley and Julius Eastman. Arthur Russell has some minimalist compositions and he also had this brilliant fusion of modern classical music with pop music, which I really love. All those people were really important. Peter Zummo, a trombone player and composer, as well. His record, Zummo with an X, I listened to a lot.

Ben: Matt was pretty much the forefront of the music influences.

Matt: I got Ben to listen to a lot of this music. He bought the Steve Reich box set and listened to that a lot. When we were touring, this was music that was becoming the background and the foreground to everything we were doing because when you’re driving a lot, the music is kind of important. It becomes something that’s etched into your mind and I wanted these types of sounds to be things that everyone was familiar with. Also, there was an effort on Jesse’s end. Jesse listens to a lot of dance music and I saw a lot of similarities between the way minimalist classical music was composed and dance music is composed. There aren’t a lot of chord changes and both are very rhythmic. The processes are very transparent when you hear the music. That seemed like a good idea for me to write a lot of these songs that are more influenced by Steve Reich and classical form of minimalism, and for Jesse to add this more electronic, dance element to it.

Why did you decide to shift to a more European, chamber pop style?

Matt: I think the baroque chamber pop sound was more on the last record (Cocoon of Love). That was more with the arrangements, a lot of arpeggios, string parts, string quartet parts, and there were harpsichords – all these things associated with baroque classicism. I think the band started out initially making music like that. Now, even though some of those same instruments are used, the effect is used in a much different way. Whereas before, they were playing endless melodies, here they’re providing almost a rhythmic bass. Instead of a rhythm guitar strumming along, we have two cellos, a violin, and a clarinet doing that one thing over and over again.

How did the ideas for the album come about?

Matt: I was in London by myself and we had a month-and-a-half off before touring. My grandfather had a bunch of frequent flyer miles and he doesn’t really go anywhere anymore. He can’t really move or travel too well so I asked him if I could have some miles and he let me. I went to London and had a friend there, who had an extra room in her house and I stayed there. I just wanted to write all the lyrics for the new record. I had some of the basic musical ideas, but wanted to write lyrics for it. That was where things began to take shape and the ideas from my songs came together. I would video chat with Ben and start sending music over. It was the coldest winter actually in London ever in recorded history so I literally could not do anything but write this music. A big chore for me in the day was to go down the street to the mini mart and get a candy bar. I would load up, put all my clothes on, go out, come right back, and sit down. -laughs-

Ben: What candy bars were you getting?

Matt: I tried to get each Cadbury bar I could find. I tried to have a different one every day. And then I started smoking cigarettes briefly.

Ben: -laughs-

Matt: You get into all these bad habits when you can’t go anywhere. I tried to get out, I mean, I got out. I would go around the city, but I’d go for a bus ride somewhere and then I’d come back. I’d look at my watch and it’s like 1:30, and I’m like “so I have ten more hours today.” And the girl I was staying with was a doctor and she was always doing the night shift at that time so there was no one to hang out with. I was just kinda like left alone.

Just you and your thoughts.

Matt: Pretty much.

And cigarettes.

Matt: Smokin’. Although there was an image on the cigarette box where they had these terrifying images of people who were suffering from diseases on them and that totally scared me half way through. I saw it and tried to rip it all apart, then throw it out and just keep the loose cigarettes in my cupboard. I just don’t like to smoke cigarettes; I think that’s what I learned from this whole thing.

Some of the titles (“To the Alps,” “Florida,” “Oklahoma,” “Grand Rapids”) give off a sense of geography. Could you go into depth behind the themes of the album?

Ben: It was basically being on tour. And those were mainly Jesse’s songs. After Matt was in London, we finished touring our first record, Cocoon of Love, and then we started writing more songs. Jesse would come up with those songs and they were always realized in those places. He would create stories in those settings where we were. We were there and they were written in those places like Florida, but then created a story about a guy being in Florida. And then in Michigan, in Grand Rapids, Jesse was talking to this really weird girl at the bar and she just did not have her life together, it seemed like. So then he created a story around her and that’s pretty much where her songs are.

Does that relate to the songs that have titles of first names like in Cocoon of Love?

Ben: Right. And there are some names in this album. Matt do you want to go into how they would tie together with your songs?

Matt: On the first record, me and Jesse both kind of had some songs that had first names as the titles of songs. And then on this record, I was going to make every single song on the record have the character’s name, like the protagonist’s name, be the title of the song. But there were a couple of examples like “Remembrance of Things to Come” and…

Ben: “Holding Teeth.”

Matt: And “Holding Teeth” that I thought those titles were better than just using the names of characters. But there’s always, on all my songs, there’s a singular narrator to the song. The song is written entirely from that person’s perspective. When I was in London, I wrote all these outlines of this elaborate soap opera of different characters who would be protagonists in different songs. It got whittled down to those five, but there were 12 songs or so originally that I had – each with a different character, each with a different time and different place in their lives where the story was being narrated from. All of them had intertwining plot lines and that’s what I was thinking. And then it goes another level when Jesse’s songs are introduced because then those plot lines intersect with these other characters, who are kind of in this different world. You have this hybrid, really, on the record – two different writing styles.

(At this point during the interview, the rest of the band members, David and Jesse, enter the room bearing bags of Chinese food.)

You originally wrote 18 songs on the record but whittled it down to 10. Will the other songs come out in a separate release?

Matt: We probably wrote more than 18, but recorded 18 with the intention that any of these could end up being on the record. Some of the other songs we’ve already released in some capacity like “Clamoring for Your Heart” and “This Weather, a Swimmer,” those songs. “This Weather, a Swimmer” was on the album and last minute, it got knocked off because it didn’t quite fit with the feeling we were looking for. And then the other songs, some of them are on the Japanese release of the record, so if you get that you can hear those songs. Go to Japan and spend a few thousand dollars -laughs-.

Ben: Some of them just weren’t finished too. We thought they were finished and then after listening to them, we were just like we want to go back to the drawing board with a few of these songs.

Matt: Like some of them we fucked up mainly. They were good songs that we fucked up in the recording studio.

Would you ever go back to them for a future release?

Matt: Probably not.

Ben: We always think we’re going to when we’re leaving the studio. It’s like “alright, we’re done with this. We’re gonna come back to the other ones later,” and then you just start writing more songs and lose touch.

Matt: The newer songs that we’ve written are much better than those songs, so we just let those fade away.

You released the To the Alps 7” last year. One of the songs, “The Electrician” (Scott Walker cover), was with Active Child. Are there any other artists you would like to collaborate with?

Matt: Yeah obviously. There are a lot. Anyone you’re a fan of, if you can somehow collaborate with them, it’s exciting. I would love to collaborate with Scott Walker -laughs-.

Jesse: We could do another version of the song with Scott Walker -laughs-.

Matt: And Active Child. Or we could cover an Active Child song with Scott Walker.

Ben: Doing a song with Terry Riley would be pretty cool.

Matt: Yeah, we wanted to try and set that up, but we don’t know him.

Jesse: I like collaborating in any capacity, but I’m not sure who would be best to work with. There’s tons of artist I like, but they might be awful to work with. Some people you just connect with and other people don’t work that way. I don’t know off the top of my head who I’d want to work with, but I’m generally available.

All: -laughs-

Matt: Another person I would want to work with is another old British guy – well Scott Walker isn’t really British but he lives there, he’s lived there for a very long time – Robert Wyatt, he was in the Soft Machine. He made all these great solo records and he’s just one of my favorite musicians. I feel the music he makes now is as vital as anything he’s ever done, so I feel like he would be really interesting to collaborate with. Someone who has all these years of perspective and then they would be willing to listen to some of my ideas. I just think that’s an interesting juxtaposition when both people are sort of humbled by working with someone who’s entirely different from them.

I was reading in a previous interview with Jesse and he said the band would play a hypothetical game on how much torture you would endure for like, Reese Witherspoon for example.

All: -laughs-

Matt: Reese Witherspoon has fallen by the wayside.

Dave: The game evolves.

Matt: Reese Witherspoon lost favor. She’s not as hot right now.

Who did she lose favor to?

Matt: I don’t even know if we have women in the game anymore. -all laugh- It’s just a lot of money is being thrown at you and then unimaginable living circumstances.

Any examples?

Jesse: I made a couple of deals with David and Ben on our last tour.

Ben: It’s like a deal with the devil -laughs-

Matt: You always end up with no legs.

Jesse: Ben ended up with no legs and he had to live in this mud hut that was on the tour that we spotted. But he only had to live there for only a few months out of the year, for the rest of his life. He had to live in this mud hut a couple months out of the year, but the rest of the year he was a billionaire.

David: But while in the mud hut, he would be broke again. -To Ben- you had a per diem in the mud hut -laughs-.

Matt: Jesse always creates a character that will kill you in the game at some point. He’s like “alright you get to live here, but there’s also this catch where there’s this assassin that’s trying to shoot you the entire time.”

David: There’s just nothing else to talk about. Either we get into fights for fun or we play games like this. Or we sleep.

What are your plans or goals for the rest of the year?

Matt: I’m just hoping that we’re gonna survive this whole 2012 thing first off.

You guys are keeping that into consideration?

Matt: The whole thing of making music is pretty irrelevant if the apocalypse fact does come true.

(Doldrums, one of the openers for the night, casually walks by and says “we’d probably die.”)

Matt: See what I’m talking about? -laughs- We would like to release this record and for it to go well, then to be able to tour all year.

Dave: Work on new music for a third record. Yeah…keep the dream alive.

Matt: Don’t quote him on that ‘keep the dream alive’ -all laugh-. Yeah, don’t end it with that.

What do you want to end it with?

Matt: The band looks great shirtless -all laughs-.

Beats Per Minute (Philip Cosores): So how do you feel at this point before the album comes out? Is it like a calm before the storm or are you nervous about how the album will be received?

Perfume Genius (Mike Hadreas): Um, I’m completely freaked out. -laughter- To be honest, I could probably be cooler about it. I get overwhelmed easily just doing the normal things I have to do… But yeah, it’s going to be what it’s going to be and I’m just happy people want to talk to me about it. That’s a good sign, right?

For sure! I’ve heard the album and I think it’s really great, if that helps.

Well, good.

So, I was looking at the Matador website and you posted descriptions of every song from the new album, Put Your Back N 2 It. In the piece, you are very blunt and honest about what the songs are about, even when it delves into some darker material; like “AWOL Marine” talks about you watching basement porn and other songs touch on addiction and prostitution. Do you have reservations about dealing so directly with this type of material?

Sometimes I have reservations about explaining it because some people have a different interpretation of what the song is about. But, I’m happy I wrote all that. Like, with “AWOL Marine,” my friend had a different idea of what that song meant and I didn’t want to disrespect her idea because people should be able to take whatever they need to from it.

Yeah, I mean, with artists, there are sort of two schools of thought. Some artists think it should all be up to interpretation, but you go a different route by putting that all out there, giving a pretty confined meaning to a song.

I guess that just feels more important for me to do, but I don’t think that has to be true for all artists. But when I’m making things, that ends up feeling the most honest to me.

Yeah, and I think that might be why people connect with your music… the honesty in it. So, it follows that you would be so forthcoming about your subjects.

In the description of the first song people heard from Put Your Back N 2 It, called “All Waters,” you talk about reservations you had publicly holding your boyfriend’s hand in some parts of Seattle. On the other hand, the video for “Hood” is very sexually open and doesn’t really pull any punches. It takes a certain amount of bravery to pursue your art with that kind of honesty, but why do you think it is harder to be brave when you are just a guy on the street?

I guess because I feel like I have more control over it when I’m making something. I’m not sure why I can’t get over it in my daily life but when I’m sitting down to make something, I can. All of those things in that video are things that I have been ashamed of or made fun of in my life and I just went ahead a made a video of it and showed it to a bunch of people. -laughter-

I dunno, if I can find any way to at least feel like a badass at some moment in my life, I’m going to do it. But, there is some weird disconnect between me walking around town and the stuff I make, sometimes. If I’m going to create something, I’d rather it come from that place than somewhere else… that probably didn’t make any sense. -laughter-

No, I understand what you mean. Like, I’m sure you get a lot of positive feedback but have you received any negative responses to being that open?

To the gayness of the video?

To the video or just to your music in general.

Yes, for some reason some people think that they should be heard when they say “that is really gay.” They are like “yeah dude, that’s gay bro” on a comment. -laughter- I just like to think about that dude watching the video and thinking “hey, I’ve got something to say,” and then that’s it. All he has to say is “that’s gay.” -laughter- Then he can go eat his sandwich or whatever. -laughter-

You gave some background on the video when it was posted on Pitchfork and you said something like “if John in Pittsburgh doesn’t want to listen to listen to my music because I’m gay, I’m okay with that.”

Poor John in Pittsburgh.

Somewhere there is a John in Pittsburgh who is really sad.

Someone wrote me and said that the people in Pittsburgh are really open and friendly. It could have been any name from any city.

The show Queer As Folk actually took place in Pittsburgh.

Did it? Oh… Maybe I should write an apology.

Sorry Pittsburgh.

We once played Pittsburgh and I got heckled. -laughter- We had only played two songs and some guy yelled “one more song!” at me. -laughter- I think that might be why I quickly went with Pittsburgh when I was talking to Pitchfork.

One of the things that differentiates Put Your Back N 2 It from Learning, your first album, is that even though the songs are about very specific situations, the lyrics are allowed to feel more universal. Was that a conscious shift when you were writing, to make the songs more universally relatable?

I think part of it is that I was new to being healthy when I wrote that first album and I was still kind of convinced that everything I was going through, well, it was just a lot better than when I was going through it. So, I was kind of thinking my problems were unique. And then when I got better, through the experiences that I had and the friends I made, I just felt more a part of things and that my experience wasn’t so unique.

Also, there was a little more pressure on me, or maybe I just put it on myself, because now I had to play my music for a label and think more about people listening to it, so I was writing more for people than just for myself.

Since you have been healthy, going from someone who battled addiction to becoming a touring musician, it seems like it might be easy to regress in your recovery.

Well, it would have been a lot cooler of me to fuckin’ do it all now. -laughter- We could be doing that stuff in a lot cooler places than, like, a basement.

It’s not something that goes away. Sometimes I forget about it for a while, but not for very long. It hasn’t been easy. But, that’s sort of the point of the music in that it’s been helpful to me. If it was just me, I would be drunk. And, I wouldn’t make it to all the things I need to do in a day.

Yeah, we wouldn’t be having this interview.

Or, we would but it would be a lot different.

Lyrics aside, the music on the new album sounds, I don’t want to say engaging, but there is definitely more going on besides what you are singing. Like, you could conceivably ignore the lyrics and still gather genuine emotion from just the melodies and the arrangements, whereas Learning seemed more like the lyrics were front and center. Is this the product of more experience with songwriting or or was it a conscious decision to expand the scope?

I think a lot of it was that I had help recording. So, it’s just a little more inviting, maybe. I was very paranoid about going into a proper studio and slapping a bunch of stuff on top of my songs just because I could. But, I wanted to think about everything a little more, while not over-thinking it.

You mentioned that you had help on the album. Who worked with you on it?

We had two producers. First I went to England and I recorded what I thought would be the whole album while I was there with producer Drew Morgan. Then, when we got home me and some other people noticed how slow the whole album was. And, I was asked if I could write more “singles” or something “single-like.” -laughter- At first I was pissed, but then when I listened to the album I realized that all those slow songs, when put together, lost some of their weight. So, I tried to write a couple new songs, still about stuff that I cared about but that were a little more fun, and I recorded them in Seattle.

Which songs were those?

“Hood” and “Take Me Home.”

Those two do stand out, because they have percussion and, well, they sound like a full band.

With “Hood,” I explained to the drummer sort of what I wanted and I didn’t really expect him to get so into it. So, when I heard him recording it I was sitting down, like I usually am when I listen, but when I heard him get into it I stood up and, -laughs- I don’t think a song I have ever written has made me stand up before.

It is that kind of moment, like Perfume Genius before that was one thing and at that moment when the drums kick in, it becomes something else. Like, it’s a little scary but it’s a little awesome at the same time.

MP3: Perfume Genius – All Waters

So, I saw you perform for Learning in probably not the best environment, at the Matador at 21 festival.

Yes. Right after The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion.

Totally.

And then we come out and walk our little asses out on stage and are like -sings- “Laaaaaaa.” -laughter- It was only, like, 10 minutes, wasn’t it? It is actually still the biggest show we’ve ever played.

I remember, and I actually tell this story to other people when I’m talking about your music, but I was in the front taking pictures and in the front everyone was really into it. But, in the back by the bar there are all the drunk people talking through it. You know, they’ve been in Vegas for a day and a half, they just saw Jon Spencer. So, during “Mr. Peterson,” right at the point where Mr. Peterson commits suicide, you hear someone in the back just yell “holy shit!” It was like he was watching football and a linebacker just leveled an unsuspecting slot receiver. And, I don’t know if it was just that he was so into the song or if it was just the content of the song…

Or he just came down a bit in that one moment. -laughter- My favorite thing is that when we were opening for Beirut, nobody there had really heard our music and when I sang “he let me smoke weed in his truck,” people would start cheering because I guess weed is something to cheer about. -laughter- I was like, “wait a second…” It would crack me up and it was weird to giggle in the middle of that song.

That’s what I was going to get at. When I saw you perform, it was emotional and it was engaging, but it seemed like the songs were still very raw and real for you. Has that faded over time or are the songs still as emotionally immediate when you perform them?

They are when I relax. Sometimes I’m too nervous or self-aware when I perform that I can’t get into it, and often times it goes back and forth within the same song.

I dunno, I still need whatever I get from performing those songs. The catharsis, I guess.

I’ve talked to other people who have seen you live and catharsis is a good word for it. It can feel like that in the audience, too. When you share that kind of emotional moment with somebody, it can feel cathartic to them as well if they can relate to what you have gone through.

I’m kind of a hippie about it, too. I don’t like to practice a lot so I don’t get too used to the songs, but my boyfriend, who I tour with, is more professional and wants to practice hard, so we fight all the time about it. I want to be legitimate and more confident and put on a good show, but I don’t want to be bored, either. It’s a tricky balance.

Because there is more instrumentation on the new album, is the performance still going to be the same, with just you and your boyfriend?

No, actually the musician who played drums on “Hood” in the studio is going to be touring with us now. He has a drum box-thing that he sits on and he plays guitar. I mean, its still pretty low-key. -laughter-

No fireworks? No go-go dancers?

No, but that would be good, though.

So, I guess it’s been a couple years since Learning came out. And, I know you were just in Europe and have toured all over. Did you ever think this little album that you made at home would allow you to do all the things that you have?

No! And, I try to stop and be grateful about it and I get so scared when I take a step back and actually think about what I am doing. That’s a really powerful thing to me. I was pretty convinced five years ago where my life was going. And, it didn’t turn out like that. It’s really crazy.

Yeah, and your musical project has turned into something that is very real for a lot of people. Like, I don’t know how aware you are of it, but Learning meant something to this small contingent of people, something more than just an album they like. Does that put pressure on you to live up to something?

I do, but it’s the best kind of pressure. The are other bullshit pressures on me, but that is the most important one.

When I first started to write this second album, I thought that I needed to convince the people that didn’t like my music before to like it now. And, I wasn’t making anything while thinking that way. But, when I reconsidered who I was writing for, that was a lot more helpful.

Perfume Genius’ sophomore album Put Your Back N 2 It is out on February 21st through Matador Records.

In response to last year’s tragic Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, Blonde Redhead frontwoman Kazu Makino curated a benefit album. As its name infers, We Are the Works in Progress consists primarily of songs in an unfinished state, ranging from fan favorites that never made it onto an album such as Interpol’s “Song Seven” and Broadcast’s “In Here the World Begins” to Karin Dreijer Andersson’s head-turning haunter “No Face,” a cut from the currently unreleased soundtrack to the Ingmar Bergman play The Wolf Hour.
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Beats Per Minute (Rob Hakimian): Out of interest, where are you at the moment?

Porcelain Raft (Mauro Remiddi): I’m in New York, in Brooklyn. I live in New York.

And the album was recorded there, is that correct?

Yeah! I moved here six months ago, basically when I recorded the album. I started to rent a place in Brooklyn, a basement. I went there and I composed all the songs on the spot and recorded them. It took roughly two months. And then Chris Coady [TV On The Radio, Beach House, Blonde Redhead] mixed the whole album. But basically it was just me in the studio, producing, recording and composing.
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