Happy New Year! To kick off 2012, I’m happy to introduce a new contributor to ENS, Jonathan Goolsby. Jonathan co-hosts Salina Underground on Cincinnati’s own WVQC already, and I think after you read this piece you’ll be impressed with his writing skills as well. Enjoy!

Taking a Chance on Artistry and Brotherhood

Jonathan Goolsby

It has been seven years since Ashley Peacock worked on his last album. That record – Begin, released under the moniker “The Times” – was a polished pop-alt offering which attracted attention from Nashville and Hollywood alike. Tracks from the album were featured on the WB’s One Tree Hill and MTV’s Teen Mom. Major labels were knocking on his door. But things, as they are sometimes wont to do, fall apart.
“In 2006, Kyle [the Times’ bassist] left,” recounts Peacock. “We tried to keep it going. There was a lot of interest in the material. And there was a week when we were doing a really ill-fated tour out East and I felt like I needed to maybe hang it up. So I took a week and prayed, and it felt like God told me to st- . . .”

Peacock pauses, reconsiders. Continues: “To quit. Or at least to stay home. After I’d made the decision to not continue with the project, I found out my wife was pregnant with our first kid, so there was something else going on there. Atlantic Records wanted the project, and I didn’t tell them no, but I said they’re gonna have to deal with an artist who won’t tour, because I’m staying home with my family, I’ve made a decision.”

So began a prodigal intermission. Peacock parted ways with his manager. He and his wife moved to South Carolina, then back to Cincinnati, raised chickens in their back yard and welcomed two children. But, as the family grew, so too did a certain creative emptiness.

Meanwhile, Todd Gilbert, Peacock’s high school friend back in Flint, Michigan, bounced in and out of local cover groups, finding no root and feeling shiftless.
“The main thing I wanted to do was to write and make my own music,” Gilbert says. “Not so much worry about a paycheck, but be more concerned about the art, playing music for anybody that wanted to hear it. I kept trying different bands, to see if any of them would bite on such a thing and it just never panned out.”

But the pair kept in touch. Off weekends, Gilbert would hop a Megabus. They would write and record. Something organic grew in the niche. Enter the Chance Brothers.

“Every time we would work together on something, we’d really gel,” Peacock asserts. “We wrote and recorded a song, and it was great. Then we wrote and recorded another song, and it was fantastic. Those two songs are going to end up on the record. And they’re probably five or six years old, at least.”

***

It is late December on a Sunday afternoon. The light is coming sideways; sun is down on the southwestern horizon. In front of me: a dilapidated ex-Catholic church in a well-worn part of Norwood. I’ve been invited to a recording studio; it has been carved out of an old Sunday school classroom. As reporter? As critic? As witness? All of the above, maybe; I don’t know.

It is eerie. Vast and appropriate. Peacock meets me outside.

“This is where Over the Rhine records,” he says, opening an adjoining room. “That’s all their merch.”

There is a lot of merch.

There is also a fully-equipped soundroom. A $10,000 board. A classic four-piece Ludwig kit. A Shure SM57 behind an improvised baffle fort. The track lights are disc-shaped; they hang like trains of flying saucers. I wait to be transported. The beat-down puke green couch in the corner looks like as good a spot as any.

“Every studio needs a big, comfy couch,” Peacock says. To Gilbert: “What did we decide? Every studio needs a big, old, ratty couch, a stack of porn and a cat.” He cocks an eyebrow. “Our porn is a stack of Modern Drummer magazines.”

The building is not insulated. Though no longer a cathedral, it is in use for something. A non-denominational congregation is holding Christmas choir practice upstairs. Squeals of kids running up and down the hard-tiled hallways and chipped mahogany staircases bleed through the walls. No worry for our intrepid brothers Chance.

“I want to document an experience,” Peacock expounds. “I want to put those songs in a time and place. Think of all your favorite records throughout history. You can probably associate either a city, or a room, or something that was happening at the time of that record.”

He thinks a moment. “Think of all the top Billboard records of the past 15 years and they’re not timeless. They have no roots. They’re just top-heavy, floating works of pop rock that don’t have a place and a time. They don’t have stories. I like records that have stories. Listen to Wrecking Ball by Emmylou Harris. That was made in an old house. You feel like you’re there.”
Mm. Does Achtung Baby get made anywhere other than Berlin in 1990?

“Exactly.”

“I learned so much from the Times record,” continues Peacock. “I started thinking, ‘OK, what room do I want to record that in? What room do I want to put the Wurlitzer in? What room do I want to do vocals in?’ So you start thinking less in terms of which microphone is going to be best mic for the job, and start thinking, ‘Where do I want to feel like I am when I hear this record?’”

More kids on the stairs. Peacock chuckles.

“Remember what we said about documenting a place and a time? Careful what you wish for, because you can get dogs barking, sirens and cars door slamming. Sometimes, that’s the stuff that makes a record. When you’re listening to Wrecking Ball and you hear the drummer’s stool squeak — that’s the stuff that draws me into a record.”

More so to my point. So God told this guy to stay home for seven years. Maybe this creaky, leaky old church is the perfect place to offer up something new. He’s done His service. Could it be that the Almighty has staid the hand holding a knife, just before it sacrificed career on a willing altar? Not unprecedented.

The session begins. Between takes, Whitney Houston impressions and various pop culture non sequiturs, obvious singles present themselves. “Ruby” will be a straightforward, climbing rock ballad in quintessential Peacock style. It’s a fight not to jump in and sing along while the tape rolls.

Strong country threads hold seams together; Gilbert’s lead vocal on “Let Me In” belies a hint of stove wood, home and hearth. There is an element of dipping a toe back in water and keeping the other foot firmly planted, ready to turn back with the slightest trepidation. I imagine “Chance Brothers” was a carefully-chosen flag to fly. Are they not sure of themselves?

“Ash, I don’t believe the ‘question in her soul’ lyric,” I venture. “Seems crowded.”

A mometary, piercing stare. “Call it artistic license.”

I’ve treaded.

They are sure of themselves. There is a circle-the-wagons vibe. Not taking one last chance, per se; more like two pioneer brothers marking their claim in the woods.

Says Gilbert, “There’s a mutual respect between the two of us. We can honestly critique each other’s work performance and be completely OK with it. We’re very open to suggestion from each other. And lots of bands can’t do that.”

“I pride myself on being a vocal guy,” adds Peacock. “I know how to get a good vocal out of people in the studio. And [Gilbert] turns around and produces my vocal. I totally trust him. I’m not gonna turn around and say, ‘Who do you think you are, I’m the vocal guy?’ He tells me to take a breath here and try this different phrasing, I’m gonna trust him.”

Gilbert agrees, smiles. “Trust in each other is the big deal. To trust that the ideas and opinions come from a good place – it’s all about serving what the song itself requires.”

“If you’re like, ‘I really like my harmony on that song, I want it to stay,’ well, who are you serving then?” Peacock asks. “You’re turning up the ‘me’ button, and that doesn’t belong on any console.”

***

“It’s nice to be able to come to an open space like this and just create without any limitations, without any fears,” offers Gilbert. He has just given a final vocal take for “Moving On.” “It’s just you and the room. Sometimes, it’s hard to take yourself back to where you were when you wrote it. But it’s worth it, realizing [that] where you were wasn’t maybe the healthiest place to be. And through the song, you’re starting to realize that. By the time you get to the bridge, you’ve realized it and you’re pushing forward.”

I toss out Joyce and the notion of writing the epiphany.

“He was probably onto something,” says Peacock. “But didn’t he die penniless?”
Gilbert: “Crap.”
“Did you use the emotion in the performance?” Peacock asks.

“Yeah.”
“That’s all I ask. Go there, deal with it, get out, leave it behind.”
Peacock looks at the console, then turns back in his chair to Gilbert. “I thought you said we were gonna go get a beer?”

“After this.”
“Is that my reward?”
“Yes.”

***

Not over beer, but after-session midnight pancakes:

“I’d always wanted to get him writing and recording again,” says Gilbert of the effort to coax his friend and collaborator out of self-imposed exile. “We always seemed to bring out something in each other that we might not have normally gotten without working together. If we write something we do, if we don’t, maybe we tried. And we wrote eight songs in six days.”

Mouthful of French toast, Peacock bites:

“[In South Carolina] I spent every Monday night in a songwriters forum. It was just a bunch of middle-aged people playing really honest songs, and it got to me. It got me appreciating the craft of creating music again. I guess that kind of primed the pump, creatively.” He washes it down.

“What did I have to lose? Todd’s safe, yet he challenges me. I knew that Todd would be OK if it didn’t go anywhere. There was no pressure. It wasn’t like going to a writing session in Nashville. It wasn’t turning in my quota as a staffwriter. It was just getting together with my buddy and seeing what happens. But I also knew that Todd would be up for pushing the creative envelope if we were able to enter that headspace. He was the perfect collaborator.”

“We’ve always seemed to musically finish each other’s thoughts,” says Gilbert. “We can really sense where the other person is going.”
Peacock: “It’s ridiculous.”
“I’d come to him with a chorus idea and we’d work out the rest of it in 20-25 minutes. I think subconsciously, we both wanted it to go somewhere, but we were OK if it didn’t,” afffirms Gilbert.

Peacock again: “My headspace was ‘I can’t think about where this might go, but I don’t want to not take it seriously.’”

Gilbert: “It’s a lot easier to focus on the work you’re doing when you have the other person with you, pushing you to do the best you can.”
Peacock: “You wanna Skype with your girlfriend or you wanna make out with her?”
“Exactly.”
Gilbert pauses, looks Peacock up and down.

“I’m not saying I want to make out with you.”

***

The record gets made when the record gets made, says Peacock.

“I went into this wanting to experiment. And it’s the first time I’ve ever made music to make music – not as a business move. You know, I didn’t have a marketing plan, or tour routing visualized ahead of time. The only reason that I have been able to be as free with this project as I have, is that I haven’t cluttered my thinking with what’s going to happen after we’re done. Because you can’t not bring that to bear on a vocal take. I have to create art to make art. The only reason that this is getting made, in my mind, is that it needs to get made. I don’t care who hears it. I don’t care what format it’s in. I really don’t. Today’s evils are sufficient unto today.”

“It’s really hard to know the direction something’s going to go,” says Gilbert, “until you know what it is.”

I bite this time. Is that why you chose “Chance Brothers?”

“We had to name it something, says Peacock, looking at Gilbert.

“Couldn’t call it Cap’n Geech and the Shrimp Shack Shooters. That was already taken.”
Peacock ruminates. “It was more about brotherhood and fellowship than marketing. And that summed up the vibe of what we’re going for soncially.”
“Giving it its own identity, I think helps take it away from what people would expect from the two of us,” explains Gilbert.

Protecting yourselves?
“[In previous efforts with The Times] we’d set a deadline to hand things over to the mastering engineer, just so that we’d have a date when it would be ‘done,’” says Peacock. “And we stay up all night long mixing, mixing, mixing, mixing, until our hearing was numb, until we couldn’t hear sounds anymore.”

“You hear the same thing over and over and over and you can’t objectively think about it anymore. And you’re like, ‘Well, it’s 8 AM. The sun’s up. We have to be at the mastering engineer’s in an hour . . . I guess it’s done. And to not have the freedom to sit back and go, ‘I want to let that simmer and soak up some flavor, and then come back to it, and see if it needs to have anything added to it.’ We didn’t have that luxury. Now, we can do whatever we want with this, and it feels awesome.”

Peacock continues. “I don’t give a shit what anybody thinks about it. Fuck you. It’s my project. It’s mine, and it doesn’t have to play by any of those rules. It’s the first time I’ve ever had anything like that. And the fact that I have somebody to work with me that has the same attitude? He’s game for anything? He’s supportive but challenging? Man, I can’t envision making a record with anyone else.”

Gilbert sums it:
“We’re not writing it to convince anybody of anything. It just needs to exist.”

After a decade and a half of music and eleven albums, Deerhoof is a band that doesn’t really need an introduction. They’ve been responsible for some of the catchiest weirdo indie rock since the start of the “indie” itself. And you know you’ve made an impact when your band’s music influences the creation of a school ballet in North Haven, Maine.

Deerhoof’s latest album, Deerhoof vs. Evil, continues this tradition in fine fashion, and is evidence for why Deerhoof is one of MidPoint Music Festival’s main attractions this year. They’ll be playing Friday night at the Know Theatre.

Recently, Deerhoof guitarist John Dieterich agreed to speak with Each Note Secure about life in what Pitchfork called “the best band in the world,” and what continues to fuel their development.
[Each Note Secure] Can you tell me about he process of creating your recent 7″ releases? It sounds like you managed to do some interesting re-imagining of songs with the likes of Jeff Tweedy and Xiu Xiu. How did these sessions come about?

[John Dieterich] It was basically an idea that Greg [Saunier] came up with as a way to work with some musicians that we really like and collaborate in this sort of unorthodox way. I think the overall big picture once they are all over will be very interesting, a snapshot of different ways that these songs could have sounded or that Deerhoof vs. Evil could have sounded.

[ENS] Deerhoof vs. Evil is an album, much like Friendship Opportunity and other Deerhoof releases, that seems to have a lot going on at once musically, and large stylistic shifts from song to song. What does the band pull from when it comes to writing songs, and does that make it difficult to finally fuse everything together to make an album?

[JD] I suppose a lot of the stylistic shifts come from the fact that we all write for the band, and we all have different ideas about where the band should be going at any time. With Deerhoof vs. Evil, we did talk a lot about what we wanted to do, but everyone was writing on our own, and we didn’t know how anybody else was interpreting the ideas we had, so maybe it’s no shock that it’s quite varied.

I think when it comes down to it, our instincts are probably more trustworthy than any grand scheming that we can do about what our next direction should be. That is, we’re a product of our experiences, and the easiest way to access the creative current running underneath all of it is to give your creativity an outlet and let it go. And then we spend plenty of time trying to harness that stuff, understand it, teach it to other people, and make a coherent album out of it!

[ENS] In contrast, Offend Maggie was one of the few recent Deerhoof records that seemed totally focused on guitar and drums for melody and rhythm. Was that just a matter of inspiration at the time or did it come with intentional limiting of keyboard and electronic instrumentation?

[JD] Yeah, that was intentional. We had just made Friend Opportunity a couple years before, and while I really like that album, it was extremely difficult to perform. It was recorded while we were a trio, and even as a quartet, we have a hard time with a lot of that stuff. So, with Offend Maggie, we wanted to strip it down to essentials and try to write music that worked with these four people playing in a room together.

[ENS] With band members’ backgrounds in musical composition, how do you balance your pop sensibilities and often unconventional song structure?

[JD] To be honest, I don’t see any incongruity between pop sensibility and unconventional song structures. I think music is about tapping into something deep and communicating with people, and you use whatever means you have at your disposal to do it. And something that’s good to remember is that we all have the potential to be charlatans and we all have the potential to do something meaningful. And it has absolutely nothing to do with musical style. It’s about your commitment to and relationship with the music you’re making.

[ENS] How important is improvisation to Deerhoof? When performing live, do the songs change? Is a Deerhoof song every truly “done?”

[JD] I guess I feel like all music is improvised on some level. It comes from somewhere (who knows where?), appears in someone’s brain in an instant or comes out of an instrument, and it moves from the state of not existing to the state of existing in some form. Even when you’re performing composed music that you’ve played a thousand times before, the truth is you have no idea what’s going to happen. You don’t know if the roof’s going to cave in. You’ve never experienced this moment before, and this moment will never happen again. All we attempt to do onstage is to bring this music to life in the way that it needs to exist on this day in this place and remain open to the possibilities that this day has to offer.
I really think that it’s something that everyone there is involved in. It isn’t us pushing music onto the audience. It’s the audience, the people who work at the venue, the band, history, etc. all expressing together whatever it is that this moment needs to express. Or that’s maybe one way of expressing the goal. Another is to say that we just wanna rock!

[ENS] After so many years together, what do you think the band has learned in terms of working together? Do you feel your time as a unit has forged an understanding that allows you to create music in a more instinctive way than a group who had less time together?

[JD] I wish that were true, to be honest. We have certainly developed instincts as far as playing together. I feel extremely tied in with these musicians as far as playing music onstage in front of people. I sometimes know what they’re going to do before they do it. At the same time, our compositional method has, in a way, pushed us apart from each other. We’re very independent, and we haven’t developed a group way of writing, and there’s part of me that’s uncomfortable with that. But we’re not done yet! Hopefully we’ll get there…

[ENS] Have there been any surprising or interesting incidents during your recent touring?

[JD] Where do I start?! We just completed a tour where we were collaborating with a group called Congotronics vs. Rockers which included musicians from the Congo, Argentina, Sweden, Belgium, and the US. It was really something! Every day was full of surprises. One of my favorites was during a rehearsal in Brussels, when all nineteen of us are rehearsing a song together, and all of a sudden I hear this crazy sawing sound, and I look to my right and see the xylophone player has a huge saw and is sawing at his xylophone! The xylophone was the quietest instrument on the stage, so in order to get it to where everyone could hear it, it had to be extremely loud in the monitors, so when he started sawing, it was actually way louder than him playing the instrument, so it was absolutely shocking. I don’t know. I could go on and on. It was an absolutely incredible experience, something I’ll never forget.

[ENS] Deerhoof is still considered by many to exist within the “indie rock” world (whatever that means), but you’ve been around long enough that your name and music is known by many. When you’re around your fans at shows and festivals, have you gotten to the place where you feel “famous?”

[JD] Occasionally, we will have people recognize us, and that’s fun, because it’s not at the level where you can’t live a normal life or something. Of course it’s great to connect with people who have this relationship with our music, and it doesn’t make it impossible to live our lives. Rather, it enhances our lives. I don’t envy people who have to spend their lives hiding from the people that connect to their art. It must be a very weird existence!

This music blog market is funny. One day, you’re sitting in your room, noodling on guitar and recording yourself playing little melodies through a few choice effect pedals. The next, your music is being big-upped all over the internet and you’re suddenly in a nationally-touring band.

That’s what happened to Steve Marion of Delicate Steve. In conversation, Marion is a quiet, thoughtful guy who set out several years ago just to be a part of a really good band in high school. Now, with a widely acclaimed debut album and his songs appearing on hipster blogs and between segements on NPR, Marion seems quietly committed to make the best of his good fortune by coming up with new and interesting music that deserves the hype.

Delicate Steve will be performing at MidPoint Music Festival on Friday night at the Drinkery.

[Each Note Secure] I hear you’re working on new material. How’s it coming?

[Steve Marion] It’s going well. I guess I started conceptualizing the new album and making new music for it about two months after I finished Wondervisions in January 2010. So I’ve been working on it on and off for a while. It didn’t start taking shape until recently.

[ENS] I understand that Wondervisions was all recorded at home in your room. Does that hold true for the new stuff as well?

[SM] It’s recorded at home. I’m kind of in limbo right now about trying to get it mixed by someone else. I’ve been doing a lot of different things, it sounds a lot different than how Wondervisions sounded. Quality-wise, and also the feeling is different. It’s more of a produced sound, even though recorded it in the same place.

[ENS] The story of Delicate Steve’s music so far has really centered on your guitar playing, which is really very impressive. Do you have any conscious approach to how you play guitar in Delicate Steve?

[SM] I guess I would say it’s kind of weird that Delicate Steve has become what I’m kind of known for outside of my friends in north New Jersey, because I was in a band in high school and I was the guitar player of the band. There were very specific parts, and I loved that. I was comfortable being the background guy.

So that was always who I was as a guitar player. Delicate Steve was never really a conscious thing of trying to start a band or project. There was just a time when it was me in my room rediscovering how to play guitar and listening to a lot of new music I hadn’t heard before that opened my mind up to playing in new ways. I was just embracing the change I was going through.

For example, I guess my high-pitch octave pedal has become a signature part of the Delicate Steve sound, but I hadn’t used that pedal in like six years, when I was a kid, trying to play Rage Against the Machine songs or something. So it was just in my room for years, and I thought it was cheesy, until I started thinking about music differently and picked it off the shelf to record some songs with it. I tried not to limit myself to what I had always thought sounded good before.
That’s how I was able to change from the person I was before the person I am now and after Wondervisions. I just learned to embrace what I had thought might sound . . . bad [laughs].

[ENS] On Wondervisions, especially on songs like “Butterfly,” you do a lot of impressive slide work on your guitar. Do you play in opening tunings? Do you have to truck around a bunch of different guitars on tour for that reason?

[SM] I stick to standard tuning. I recorded everything [on Wondervisions] in standard tuning. I never really got into open tunings because I think it was a little scared. I got into slide, though, after finally getting into the Allman Brothers in high school, after hating them because my dad liked them. I couldn’t stand them, and then [all of a sudden] they consumed me and I finally decided to pick up the slide. That was overwhelming enough, trying to play along with Allman Brothers songs. I read that he did his a lot of his slide playing in standard tuning, so I just played along to those songs. So I never got into open tunings, but I’d like to.

[ENS] Sounds like you’re able to have a lot of string control with your left hand, to be able to do all those complicated slide parts in standard tuning.

[SM] Yeah, for “Butterfly,” I took a Gibson SG 2, the weirder version of the original Gibson SG, that I bought on eBay a while ago. I played it sitting down the guitar on my lap. I didn’t use a pick; I was just punching the strings with the thumb of my right hand. I was able to shake the slide left and right really fast to get a lot of vibrato. I think that might have made a difference in how much I was able to jump around.

[ENS] How much of Delicate Steve’s success do you feel is owed to the North Jersey music scene?

[SM] I don’t really know what a music scene is. It’s just all our friends from different areas and cliques . . . it’s why I play music . . . because the band I was in during high school was so meaningful to me . . . that’s why I didn’t go to college and my friends didn’t go to college. We put our heats into it.

After [the band] broke up, it took me awhile to get back into making music again, but it eventually went back [to that feeling].

[ENS] When you got back into making music, was there something about your approach that made Delicate Steve an instrumental project?

[SM] I didn’t really have any intention for Delicate Steve becoming a band when it started; that’s why I put my name on it. At the time, [my friends and I] were our own little art collective and local record label. So somebody would record an album in my house and release it under the name of whoever wrote the songs. So [Wondervisions] was just my first album, the first thing I was able to make myself, in my room. It wasn’t really a conscious choice to make it an instrumental album, it was just like, “What are all the things I can do in my room to complete this album?” And singing wasn’t one of them [laughs] so that was how that happened.

-Interview by John Crowell @terriblesounds

Sean Daley (aka Slug) is one busy guy. A few days ago, he managed to squeeze in time for a quick conversation with Each Note Secure while tending to press duties at the KahBang Music Festival in Maine. Even with all his obligations of the day, Daley came off as an exceptionally polite rapper, sincerely apologizing when festival reps kept interrupting our conversation to shepherd him to other engagements.

Along with his politeness, Daley emits infectious energy and positivity. This is probably a necessity for his multifaceted career – driving force behind rap groups Atmosphere (the headlining act for his current Family Vacation Tour which will be stopping by Bogarts in Cincinnati on August 16th) and Felt, as well as co-founder of Rhymesayers Entertainment, a hip hop label in his home town of Minneapolis, Minnesota. Due to his considerable time constraints, this conversation turned into one of the quickest interviews I’ve ever conducted. However, Daley’s positive energy made it up in pure sincerity what it lacked in length.

[Each Note Secure] Can you tell me a bit about the Family Vacation Tour? Are other artists with Rhymesayers going to be there?

[Sean Daley] Yeah, an artist named Evidence who’s part of Dilated Peoples, and another named Blueprint, who’s actually from Ohio. Also, another rapper named Prof. He’s not a Rhymesayers artist but he’s a friend of mine from Minneapolis.

[ENS] What’s your day to day responsibility at Rhymesayers? I understand that Atmosphere’s music is released through the label, but what’s your role when it comes to the rest of the business?

[SD] I co-own it. You gotta imagine nowadays, as busy as Atmosphere stays it’s kinda hard to wear this hat as well as play a huge role at the label. I’ve backed off as far as the label work and getting my hands too dirty with that so I can focus on Atmosphere and keep this boat floating for a while.

[ENS] I really like your new record, The Family Sign. Can you tell me about your inspiration for writing the single Last to Say? It seems to have some powerful things to say about the issue of domestic violence.

[SD] It’s a song I’ve been waiting to write for a long time. If we ourselves haven’t been in close proximity to a situation like that, we know someone who has. And I felt like, in my love for rap music, we as artists haven’t taken the biggest stance against domestic violence. It was a song I wanted to write and get out of my system.

[ENS] That’s really awesome. When it comes to producing the art which exists around the music like videos and visual packaging, how do you go about collaborating with others?

[SD] We see Rhymesayers as a vehicle for a lot of our friends to express themselves and do a lot of things they love to do. We tend to be friends with everyone we work with.

[ENS] What do you think coming out of the Minneapolis music scene gave you as an artist?

[SD] Work ethic. I feel that coming from a city that does not take itself for granted musically has built a really strong worth ethic in me. Truthfully, I think it built a strong work ethic in my parents which parlayed itself into a strong work ethic for me. But it’s hard to answer the question. Minneapolis isn’t an easy city to break out of with music, but in the same breath, I can’t imagine what it would be like to try to break out of New York, where it’s filled with people trying to break out.

[ENS] I read once that during the early days of Atmosphere, you once drove from Minneapolis to Dallas, Texas to play a show for $250. Is that true?

[SD] Yeah . . . that’s true [laughs]. I don’t remember where I said that but it’s funny because people quote me on it all the time. You know, we used to drive from Minneapolis to Cincinnati to play shows for a hundred bucks. We’d sleep on floors and couches and shit. There’s a guy there name Mr. Dibbs from Cincinnati who I’m friends with . . . we used to sleep on that fucker’s floor all the time, back when he was really fat [laughs].

[ENS] I also really enjoy your other hip-hop project, Felt. Are there any upcoming plans for new material?

[SD] You know, Felt records are never something we really plan. I just give Murs a call and if we’re both free we just say, “Fuck it, let’s make a record.” It keeps it pretty fresh and spontaneous.

[ENS] Over the years, as Atmosphere has gotten bigger and better known, do you feel that your process for writing and producing music has changed?

[SD] Ultimately, you want to get better at what you do. You want to develop your craft, evolve, and become better at it. So you take on new steps and challenges and try new things. For better or worse, it does make you a more well-rounded artist. Whether or not it makes you better, I don’t know. But time and evolution has played a huge role in the direction that we’ve gone. I can’t say that we’ve gone in any certain direction; I feel like on each record we’re trying something different. But that’s what keeps the spice of life going so that we as a unit or family don’t get bored with each other.

[ENS] Do you think the sweat equity you put into your music early on helped you in your career overall?

[SD] Definitely. I’ve been in control of my own destiny for so long that I wouldn’t know what to do if I put my destiny in the hands of somebody else. I couldn’t imagine working like that. I’m a control freak.

-Interview by John Crowell

The last few years have been ones of drastic change for Interpol. The college radio superstars’ move to Capitol records proved short-lived, yielding only one record in more keyboard-leaning (but perhaps not as consistently lauded as their early work) Our Love to Admire. Since that time, the band made their way back to their original indie label home at Matador Records and released a self-titled record, leaning even further away from the sound of their mostly guitar-filled first two albums.

However, they came out of the sessions for Interpol minus a core member: bassist, keyboardist, and co-composer Carlos Dengler. Since then they’ve shuffled through bass players, after original replacement David Pajo (of Slint and Papa M fame), left to attend to family matters. A string of planned U.S. opening dates with U2 were cancelled last year after Bono suffered a back injury.

However, after the European U2 dates that went off without a hitch and Interpol managed to solidify a long list of headlining dates over the spring and summer (they’ll be appearing at Bogarts here in Cincinnati on July 6th), the band seems finally back on track and ready to take their new circumstances as they come. Guitarist and founding member Daniel Kessler recently spoke with Each Note Secure about this important time in Interpol’s career.
[Each Note Secure] Interpol has certainly carved out a name for itself with its records and touring history, so what was it like opening for a band on the level of U2? Did you have any moments of finding yourselves out of your element?

[Daniel Kessler] It’s different any time you’re not playing in front of your own audience. We seldom open up for another band; since the beginning we’ve always done our own tours, besides festivals of course. I didn’t really over think it though, maybe from playing so many shows at this point. I just kind of went up there, and at the end of the day it’s nothing more complicated than playing your own songs. Obviously, though, it’s someone else’s stage and you’re playing for a crowd who’s there to see the band after you.

It was a great experience, though. Their fans were very kind to us and very receptive. It was a lot of fun night after night.

[ENS] I remember reading interviews with Interpol as far back as the press coverage for Turn on the Bright Lights in 2002, and I remember being struck at the time by how important you all stated it was to keep things equal and democratic when it came to the function of the band. Now that it’s been a while since Carlos has left, have you found a new balance or direction with only three decision-makers?
[DK] Bands are always going to be complicated when it comes to making decisions, especially when you’re trying to make it democratic. You want everyone to have a say on something, but when you’re coming up with a consensus sometimes it’s unanimous and easy and sometimes there are different viewpoints. It never changes that we have a lot of discussion about anything that we do or something that’s on the table.

Since it’s been the three of us, we’ve just continued that way. There’s a lot we discuss and if someone’s really not feeling something we usually don’t do it. Or if someone has questions about something the other guys were really into we try to have a dialogue about it. I think it’s important – everyone’s invested in this thing and is putting in the time and energy so you want to make it so everyone feels ok about everything we’re doing.

[ENS] To my ears, Interpol has never been a band that has made a severe change to its sound from record to record, although there has been a slow organic shift. Do you feel there will be a more drastic shift going forward after losing an original member?

[DK] I think it’s my nature to be more of a natural-growth person – I don’t like forced changes, I like things to happen naturally. And that’s the way it’s been thus far. We have natural changes as we advance in our lives as people and we want our art to grow and change with us. Some people might have a different approach where they’ll want to rip everything up and do it totally differently.

I feel like whenever we go back to the board with a fresh palette we try to do something differently but it’s never forced – it’s more of a desire to have a different approach. I think all of our records have certain traits that will remind people of our band but each have their own growth and sense of progression, and [Interpol] is no exception.

Moving forward, I don’t know what it’ll be like yet. One thing that’s been consistent in the band is that we never make too many plans. It’s never been something that’s worked well, in terms of making grand designs when you’re not there yet. It’s one thing when you’re actually at that table and you’re ready to go, but we’ve still got a few tours ahead of us before we get to that point, and we’ve already toured quite hard over the last year. And I like that – I’d rather wait and see what we want to say at that moment rather than saying, “Here’s what we want to see four, five, six months from now…” We’ll want to know what we want to say when we start saying it: that makes more sense.

[ENS] Interpol has always seemed to have an intentional aesthetic with your dress, album artwork, stage settings, and videos that has been . . . I don’t want to say “monochromatic,” but probably “dark.” I recently caught your most recent video, “Barricades,” and it seems to have been shot with a lot more vibrant color, with even a few bursts of what looked like a color test pattern. Was this simply a choice by the video director, or does it reflect any aesthetic changes you’re making going forward?
[DK] I feel like there’s the outside perception of our band as being dark and macabre and so forth – I don’t think of our band that way and I certainly don’t think of the individuals in the band that way. I see Paul [Banks] often wearing very colorful shirts – I’m probably the one who wears the darkest clothes. I like to wear a black suit and a white shirt and it’s kinda my uniform. It’s not really dark so much as a classy kind of thing for me.

For something like “Barricades” the director pitched us on the treatment and the setting and we liked it. Even a video like the one for “C’mere” isn’t such a dark video. I understand that most of our videos have an introspective setting because that’s how the music is and it makes sense. However, I don’t feel we have limitations to the aesthetics of what we put out there. I realize we’ve put things out there that have been more dark in nature, but I don’t think that it’s because it’s how we want to be completely represented to people; that’s just how it’s been here and there.

[ENS] Do you have complete control over all the artwork and video aesthetics, or do you let others take their own ideas on how to present the band visually and run with them?

[DK] No, man, since day one we’ve had 100% control over the aesthetics and recording and anything that gets out there. And anyone who works for us understands that. It doesn’t mean that every single thing we’ve done has been created by the band entirely, but everything we’ve done has been approved or worked on or molded with someone else. We obviously don’t make our own videos but everything that’s out there aesthetics-wise pertaining to the band has been through the band’s process.

[ENS] I think Interpol’s an interesting band in that you were really a leader in the first generation of bands that had a major presence in the blogosphere world of indie rock that’s developed over the last ten years. As a band who’s so intentional with your aesthetic and output, how do you feel about existing in this more open-source environment?
[DK] First of all, I accept it. I think that’s important. I’m not going to sit here and talk about “the good old days,” . . . that’s silly. I think we came out at a very interesting time. For our first record, obviously the internet was already quite prevalent but people weren’t downloading the way they are now – people still bought records. I think the way people found out our band was a bit more of a slow-paced word-of-mouth manner, closer to the old way – through college radio, independent record stores, and just people telling friends . . . you could really tell during the touring cycle.

By the time we put out Antics [things had changed]. It leaked ten days after we finished the record and two and a half months before the release date. So it was the beginning of how things are for bands these days, for the most part. It was an interesting time.

That said, I’ll always look at the great side of where we’re at in terms of a band being able to communicate directly with an audience and an online community. That [represents] freedom and that’s great. There are opportunities for people all over the world to be connected to communities worldwide. If you live in a small town you’re not punished for not having a really great record store. Even if you have a really specific taste in music you can go [online] and find music and other people and have a conversation – you’re not isolated. You’re also not at the direction of all the people between you and the band, meaning record labels and radio stations. You can have a direct connection, and to me that aspect is really exciting. I’m sure twenty years ago we couldn’t have had an understanding of really how quickly we’re accelerating towards this direct connection.

Interview by John Crowell @terriblesounds

The Vivian Girls’ have had a busy couple years, and not necessarily only as the Vivian Girls. The two founding members, Cassie Ramone and “Kickball” Katy Goodman, have been busy not only with dealing with the waves of overwhelming infatuation and nasty backlash from their meteoric blog-fueled rise in the indie-lo-fi-rock world, but also with replacing drummer Ali Koehler after she left to join Best Coast, tending to their own side projects (The Babies and La Sera, respectively), preparing their third and most polished album to date only to have it leak weeks before its release date, and guesting on tracks by the likes of Male Bonding.

More recently, Ramone and Goodman appeared in the Black Lips’ “Go Out and Get It” video, which was filled during the three-day Bruise Cruise Festival this February, during which both bands, including other garage-rock groups such as the Strange Boys, Thee Oh Sees, and the Turbo Fruits, rocked a Bahamas-bound Carnival Cruise ship. After coming back from sea, both bands decided to tour the country together this spring. They’ll both hit the Southgate House on April 20th.

While they got ready to hit the road, Cassie Ramone agreed to talk to Each Note Secure about the flurry of activity leading up to this springtime road trip, and how, after somehow surviving the blog hype rollercoaster, Vivian Girls are doing better than ever.

[Each Note Secure] We all enjoyed seeing you and Katy Goodman in the Black Lips’ “Go Out and Get It” video. How did that come about? Was it as fun as it looked? Did it lead at all to your tour with the Black Lips?

[Cassie Ramone] We were kind of hanging around when they were filming the video and I think everyone mutually decided it would be funny if we made a cameo. It was a very spur of the moment decision; the tour had already been booked for a while at that point. And yes, it was as much fun as it looked!

[ENS] How has the band adjusted with new drummer Fionna Campbell?
[CR] It’s been amazing having Fiona in the band. She was a natural fit as soon as we started practicing with her. She fits into my and Katy’s dynamic really well; she is a very positive and inspirational person.

[ENS] I was recently able hear and see the video for “I Heard You Say.” I notice that the production sounds a little more polished and defined, with your voices really taking center stage. Is the rest of your new album,Share the Joy like this? What led to this change?

[CR] It was definitely an intentional decision to make Share The Joy a little more produced-sounding. We felt as though the new songs wouldn’t work as well with our earlier style of production. In the end, it’s all about choosing a method of recording that fits with the songs. I believe that our first two albums sound exactly as they should have, and the same goes for this one. For all I know our next album might be loud and blown-out sounding again, if we think it fits with the songs.

[ENS] When your new album, Share the Joy leaked online, you made the digital download free with album preorders. How do you feel about the complications presented by the web when releasing albums? The Vivian Girls got a lot of its early attention as a band through online media outlets, but is it a double-edged sword?

[CR] Well, I feel like when we began the band, album leaking was already a reality… so it never phased us that much. At this point it’s pretty much inevitable that a band’s album will leak, which is something as a band you have to acknowledge and figure out your own way of working with. Music is definitely strange in the internet age. It’s easier for bands to get exposure, which is positive if you want to be able to make a living off music. But it’s also easier for people to tear down bands once they get a little bit of attention. I believe that the concept of “hype” is very closely tied to the internet and once people get word that a band is hyped it’s harder to approach their music in an honest and visceral way, which is how I wish everyone could approach my music.

[ENS] A few years and a handful of albums seems to be the usual time for the standard accusations of “selling out” and other elements of backlash to occur for a band like Vivian Girls. Is this what you’re referring to? Does the push to keep the band going as a source of income ever cause you any issues with ethos?

[CR] I don’t think “selling out” is as strong of a concept as it used to be, because as a band you can get huge without having to do very much thanks to the internet. If people like your mp3s, that’s all you need: you can become very popular without a manager, record label or years of touring. For Vivian Girls, I believe that the worst is over: we’ve already suffered through a terrible hype and backlash cycle with our first album and I’m pretty sure that anyone who knows of us has already made up their minds whether they like us or not. We’ve been living off the band since our first album came out, which has been amazing. Thankfully we live pretty moderate lives and are able to sustain ourselves mostly through touring. We’re not opposed to licensing, but it depends heavily on the product.

[ENS] Do you consider Vivian Girls a “punk” band? Does that relate at all to how you release recorded material and operate during tours?

[CR] Absolutely. When we began we were very DIY. We booked tours, silkscreened t-shirts, burned and glued together CD-Rs, toured in Katy’s Honda Civic, etc. Even now that we’ve gotten a little bigger we still operate in a pretty DIY manner. We drive and manage ourselves on tour for the most part, do our own merch, and have ultimate control over our artwork and recordings. It’s hard, because a lot of the bands we get associated with never came from a punk/DIY background. But I hope people realize that this part of our history always was and still is really important to us.

[ENS] People always seem to make a big deal about the gender of the Vivian Girls, which has always seemed unfair to me, because I never see interviews with Wavves or Surfer Blood, for example, focusing on the fact that all the members are male. However, the Vivian Girls are now on their third drummer, and the makeup of the group remains consistently all-female. Whether it was your intention from the beginning or not, has the Vivian Girls’ career so far represented any kind of gender politics for you as the members?

[CR] We used to say that gender shouldn’t matter, and that we wanted to be regarded as just a band, not an “all-female” band. But the more that I’ve thought about it, it’s practically impossible to separate one’s work from their gender. I test myself sometimes — “Would this affect me differently if the gender was reversed?” — and unfortunately, the answer is usually yes. When we started out we weren’t on a gender politics bias at all, but at this point in time we own up to and embrace the fact that we are all women. The fact that all our members have been female is more of a coincidence than anything else, but I do think it happened for a reason. It’s aesthetically powerful to see all women on a stage, and it means something that we’ve gotten to where we are without a man’s face or name to stand behind.

[ENS] How does the Vivian Girls members’ solo projects (La Sera, The Babies, etc.) affect your operation as a band, if at all?

[CR] It’s also good for us to be productive. We used to work on Vivian Girls almost every day. Nowadays there isn’t as much work to be done for Vivian Girls most of the time. Also, the other bands help us flex different musical muscles and come back to the band with new ideas.

[ENS] It looks like you have a pretty extensive tour lined up this spring. Are there any dates on it that particularly excite you?

[CR] We’re really excited to tour Spain. We’ve only ever played Barcelona and Madrid before, but the crowds at those shows were so great. I’m sure the whole tour will be excellent. I always love full US tours. We’re hitting a few cities that we’ve never played before, such as Kansas City (home of Burt Bacharach!), St. Louis, and Pawtucket, RI. And of course we are really excited to come to Newport, Kentucky!

-interview by John Crowell @terriblesounds

Vivian Girls are opening for Black Lips at the Southgate House April 20th.

(White Hinterland and S. Carey are playing Mayday in Northside December 11th)

Buy the new Eidolon EP for 1$ here.

Casey Dienel is all about changes. A few years ago, she declared that she would stop releasing music under her own name, instead taking up the moniker “White Hinterland.” This year, she and her songwriting/recording/touring partner Shawn Creeden threw off the orchestral, lilting sounds of Dienel’s previous work in favor of electronic sampling, abstract beats, and bit-crushed organs. 2010’s Kairos surprised critics, not just because of its haunting melodies, but because of the extreme willingness of an artist to switch things up while she was still introducing herself to the world.

For someone with such an adventurous musical reach, Dienel is something of a quiet person. Softspoken and cautiously optimistic, she carefully arranges her thoughts in ways she might arrange a string section: methodically and with purpose. In the days leading up to her winter tour opening for S. Carey (drummer for Bon Iver)’s solo project she spoke with Each Note Secure about the base elements of Winter Hinterland and how fuse to make the whole. They’ll be stopping by Mayday in Northside on Saturday, December 11th.

[Each Note Secure] Can I ask you about Kairos? It sounds a lot different from White Hinterland’s first album, Phylactery Factory. What went into your songwriting decisions and the recording process?

[Casey Dienel] It takes me on average about two years to make a record. It’s a really organic process, so if something shifts I tend to follow my instincts … kind of like if you were walking in the dark through a corridor and there was a dip or turn … if you just listen you know which way to go. I kind of follow that method musically. I never sat down to write an electronic or experimental album.

What I consider writing is that you’re a vessel and you extrapolate all these ideas out of the environment around you. [Around the time of Kairos,] I had been moving a lot and I decided I didn’t want to move quite so often because I tour a lot. I had moved to Oregon and I didn’t have most of my instruments and I had to build an entirely new band lineup. It was just Shawn [Creeden] and me and we decided to see how far we could take the arrangements when it was just the two of us.

[We tried to] imagine if a new instrument could take the place of a violin or a guitar. At first I was really scared when I listened to the first mixes and I started thinking, “wow, this is really different.” But I’m not the kind of person who’s afraid of trying out new things. I’m more interested in the quality of the work.

I don’t think the next record will be quite as different because there isn’t all the tumult that lead up to the recording of Kairos. It’s sort of quieted down some.

[ENS] Speaking of Shawn Creeden, can you describe how the two of you divide responsibilities within the band?

[CS] We have a unique partnership. The way we usually describe it is that I’m the director and arranger and he’s the auxiliary. I need to be alone with songs for a month or two to decide what I want from them and he comes into the studio and shines light on all the crevices. I show him the material for molding into the song and he has a bunch of tools in a witchdoctor bag he can use to turn the song inside out.

[ENS] Both of White Hinterland’s albums sound very lush. Kairos replaces Phylactery Factory’s orchestral fullness with electronic fullness. How do you accomplish these sounds in a live, touring context?

[CS] I think in my head I hear very big, orchestral sounds. It’s the nature of my background… I went to school for composition. It can be very frustrating. I’ve heard other songwriters and composers express a similar frustration where your eyes are bigger than your stomach… you can hear more but you can’t quite place exactly what you’re hearing at first. You have to put your ear to the ground and see what the song needs.

When I started I found the easiest place to realize the big dreams I had for the songs was in the studio. It’s an ideal vacuum to work out of because everything is chalk form. It’s when you tour that you realize it’s not easy to tour with a whole orchestra [laughs]. I think that’s part of the challenge as an artist; to realize your dreams without sacrificing too much but also to make them real. I was lucky on this album because we worked the songs out live first … we didn’t put them together in the studio. I was adamant on making these sounds that were very otherworldly but very tangible in terms of what our capabilities are.

[ENS] How did you get into music? Did you start at a young age?

[CS] I was about four years old when I started piano lessons. Before I started lessons I remember wanting to play. My parents were both musicians … my dad is actually an amazing guitarist. We had music at all times around the house. It felt like if you weren’t playing you weren’t in the thick of the discussion.

[ENS] I understand you attended the New England Conservatory of Music for a while. How do you feel official theory and composition instruction interacts with the creative process? Does that knowledge help with songwriting inspiration or hinder it?

[CS] Part of discipline is muscle memory, and that’s important no matter what you’re doing. If you’re cooking, if you’re an athlete, or if you’re a dancer you train your body to supersede the entire human form altogether. That’s also what you do if you’re a singer or musician: you can take these [musical] forms and without thinking about it you can go back to them and use them. It’s like having a toolkit. Having music training is like having a few extra tools in my kit.

When I’m writing I try not to over-intellectualize it. I don’t write based on complementary keys… I just see what comes naturally. What’s nice with the extra tools in the kit is if I’m stuck on something I’m rarely stuck forever. I can always figure out where the light at the end of the tunnel is through theory.

It’s magical and mystifying to me the way chords come together and overtone theory works. On a daily basis I’m completely mystified by all kinds of music, and that’s why I do it. I’m always thinking of something new or being astonished by something else I’ve never really realized before. I guess that has something to do with knowing theory but it also has something to do with being curious and exploring.

[ENS] Like many new artists, a lot of your exposure has come by way of online press. How do you feel the internet has shaped the arc of your career so far? Does it affect the ways in which you interact with your fans?

[CS] I think if I had my way I’d rather have people send me a letter to my house and we’d have a pen pal program. I don’t know how comfortable I am with some aspects of the internet, especially Facebook. I do like how the middle man is removed by some services like Twitter or through just our direct inbox email. I get a lot of emails where people seem to think they’re not writing directly to us, like maybe we have an assistant or manager fielding these things, which we don’t. Sometimes people seem surprised to hear back from us.

I like to hear how it’s going. I want to hear if someone is bummed because last night’s show was over-21 and they couldn’t get their friends in, or the sound was bad that night and they felt like they paid too much. They’re small things but they add up. A lot of times we’ll see someone at a few of our shows and get to know them … I think the internet is just another way of extending that olive branch.

[ENS] What do you have coming up in the world of White Hinterland?

[CS] We have a new release coming very soon. But that’s all I can really say about it because we’re still finishing everything. I think we’re going to decide in a meeting this afternoon.

I’m excited to see what happens in 2011!

Buy the new Eidolon EP for 1$ here.

interview by John Crowell @terriblesounds

What happens when noise-rock kids decide to stray back to melody? If you’re Robin Silas Christian, Kevin Hendrick, and John Arthur Webb of Male Bonding, you slap together a record of insanely catchy and slightly unhinged ramshackle punk rock, sign to Sub Pop records, and tour the world.

These three, to varying degrees, used to be in the noise rock group Pre, which combined Les Savy Fav-style confrontational party-starting with the ferociousness and atonality of Melt Banana. After the (apparent) demise of that band, the guys put their heads together and wrote a collection of songs in the East London flat they all shared, songs which would eventually become the hard rocking Nothing Hurts, released earlier this year on Sub Pop. Their music has the exuberant energy and positive vibes of a group of passionate noise kids playing with melody for the first time.

Robin Silas Christian recently agreed to answer a few question from Each Note Secure about how this all got started and where it’s going. Be sure to catch them opening for Best Coast at Grammar’s Topic Design Tent at MidPoint Music Festival Thursday night.

[ENS] How did Male Bonding get together?

[Robin Silas Christian] We met at various shows a few years back (bands like Q and Not U, Klang, and Erase Errata) and through our mutual friend Giles. Kevin [Hendrick] introduced me to John [Arthur Webb] at a show my old band Bullet Union was playing and I moved in with John soon after…and then Kevin moved in with us later on… we also all worked for Reckless Records which is where we had the idea to do a band.

[ENS] Does the name “Male Bonding” have anything to do with how the three members of the band relate to each other?

[RSC] Sure, it’s a reference to the fact we ended up living together and decided to mark this with something creative!

[ENS] As I read about Male Bonding in the indie music press, I keep seeing references to the East London music scene. Do you feel like there something intrinsic about that musical community which added to the development of your band?

[RSC] When we started out two of our friends’ bands had started around the same time and I think we all stuck together through mutual respect and a strength in numbers attitude – Graffiti Island and PENS. Both great bands. Conan, who plays in Graffiti Island, Mazes, and runs the label Italian Beach Babes “found” a box of tapes at his job at MTV… he released a tape of all three of us on his label. We each drew a cover design and because it sold so well we decided to keep releasing stuff ourselves this way – just writing songs and then putting them out, no gaps. This method of doing things quickly and being inspired by what our friends were up to was probably the most important development as it meant things didn’t get stale.

There are a bunch of bands we are friends with who play music in East London (and elsewhere). Maybe [we’re] bound by an attitude more than a sound. It’s really cool.

[ENS] I understand that the three of you were in PRE. Now Male Bonding is happening and [lead singer] Akiko Matsuura is drumming in the Big Pink. Does PRE have any plans to work together in the future?

[RSC] I played drums for PRE for one tour and really enjoyed it, but it was never my band. I was covering for Rick (my flat mate at the time) who was the real drummer. His drumming is an inspiration to me. As far as I know that band is no more.

[ENS] Coming from the more “noise-rock” context of PRE, how do you approach the more hook-driven punk rock you’re creating in Male Bonding? Do you feel that noise plays a part in your songwriting?

[RSC] We just started writing music that was refreshing to us. We didn’t really think about it too much but it was more fun to play with melody as we hadn’t really done that much before. We’ll always be a bit noisy to some but to us we’re just a noisy pop band.

[ENS] What is it like starting in England and then signing to an American label (Sub Pop)?

[RSC] Well nobody in England offered to release our records, I think some people were scared to ask as we probably seemed so independent from the outside but we were just getting on with things. Sub Pop is a label we all have a great deal of respect for, and when they called us up we were really flattered. Seeing their logo on the back of our records is a dream come true and we are stoked to be working with them.

[ENS] Are you still able to do work for your own record label, Paradise Vendors?

[RSC] Yes for sure, it’s a good feeling releasing records but we’re more keen on putting records out by other bands. It’s a good thing to put our time and money into.

[ENS] I understand that your writing process is very collaborative. Can describe how a Male Bonding song comes together? What parts do you deliberately construct? What parts do you leave to instinct, improvisation, and chance?

[RSC] It always varies. Nowadays for the most part John brings in an idea and we just ride it out until it sounds good. We never spend that long on something as it’s important for things to have an energy that isn’t stale, or sound “over thought.” Because we know each other well I like to think we can almost pre-empt what someone will do next. If it doesn’t work we just can it and sometimes we come back to it a lot later with fresh ears.

[ENS] What are your plans for the future?

[RSC] We are currently on tour with Best Coast in the States and Canada, then we tour the UK with No Age, and then we tour Europe with Crystal Castles. We’re about halfway through our second record which we will record next year with John Agnello. We have already been drunk and eaten some cheese with him. It should work out well.

-Interview by John Crowell @terriblesounds

Ted Leo has been recording and performing music for over twenty years. Cutting his teeth in hardcore bands like Citizens Arrest and Chisel, Leo started writing music and touring as “Ted Leo and the Pharmacists” at the very end of the 90’s. Now, more than ten years later, Leo company is touring behind their sixth album, The Brutalist Bricks, which was released by Matador Records this year.

A music blog firestorm erupted recently when Leo announced that 2010 will be the last year he and the Pharmacists will be operating as a full-time band, and that he would be entering a sort of undefined semi-retirement. His show Friday night at the Southgate House as part of MidPoint Music Festival may be the last time many in the Cincinnati area have an opportunity to see him perform. As he prepared to head out on a new leg of his North American tour, Leo agreed to talk with Each Note Secure about this most recent career decision, among other things. Special thanks to Caitlin for question suggestions.

[Each Note Secure] Over the years of touring and recording, the lineup for the Pharmacists has changed a few times. Do you feel like these shifts have led to any changes in the band’s sound or live show?

[Ted Leo] I think it has to a degree. I’ve played under the name “the Pharmacists” for over ten years now, so there’s bound to be some changes, but I think the most qualitative change was that in the beginning it was much more of a solo project. So if [the Pharmacists] were performing as a band, it would often just be whichever friends were willing to go out on the road for a month for no money. [laughs] There was a free-wheelingness to the music back then that I sometimes think I miss a little bit. But what has happened over the last six years is that it’s become a more steady cast of characters and more of an actual band. Which I think, subsequently, once we got tight, allowed us to get a little looser again, if that makes any sense.

[ENS] I, along with a lot of other people, really liked your “Bottled Cork” video with Paul F. Thompkins and John Hodgman. How did you get hooked up with all these people?

[TL] There’re both friends and mutual admirers of each other’s work. It was really focused around the director, John Scharpling, who was the one who introduced me to Paul and John and brought us all together as friends. He got us all to be in the same place at the same time to be in the video.

[ENS] I think I also caught a cameo by Titus Andronicus’s Patrick Stickles in there. Do you guys share some New Jersey music camaraderie?

[TL] Absolutely. New Jersey is a tough nut to crack in some ways. For such a small state, it’s a pretty diverse state and there’s a big difference between growing up right outside of New York City versus growing up twenty miles outside of the city. And even in South Jersey, if you’re across the river from Wilmington, Delaware you have whole different set of experiences than if you grow up across the river from Philadelphia. It’s a pretty interesting place in that regard.

When I was in bands and growing up there I was very much a part of the New York music scene, which obviously crossed over into East Jersey, but there was also a separate Jersey scene that I definitely felt tapped into but was not as much a part of. So for a while, I think I felt distanced from the music scene there, but never from the state or what it means to grow up there. I mean, I bleed Jersey to this day.

It’s been a long time since I’ve felt so much chemistry with bands from New Jersey, but this whole crop of young bands from around Jersey, like Titus Andronicus, for example, or the Screaming Females, who we’ve been touring with a lot this year – I just admire them so much. They’ve just been creating the scene anew there, just on their own, and making some of the best music I’ve heard in years. It’s totally inspiring just on a surface level, but for me even more so because I know where they’re coming from, because it’s where I came from.

[ENS] So was the whole “rock n’ roll musical” theme to the video a swipe at things like Green Day’s Broadway show?

[TL] It’s poking fun at the whole idea. People want to jump on it and scream, “It’s a direct swipe at Green Day!” Green Day is included on the list of things that it’s doing a little bit of a piss-take on. It’s more just a goof on the whole idea of stringing together some thin narrative around some songs that a band has written. Really, the Baby Boomers have been a lot guiltier than Green Day with all that stuff. There was that Bob Dylan musical that came out a few years ago… and the Beach Boys one and the freakin’ Beatles travesty Across the Universe. I don’t doubt that there are ways you could do it which could be amazing, but generally I find it be a pretty ridiculous idea.

I’m actually a fan of musical theater, and what has happened to the play, for example, over the last twenty years is a joke. It’s just pure tourism. There’s rarely anything new. I’d be interested in seeing Fela. I hear it’s pretty autobiographical, rather than just being about youth and love and struggle, which is a formula you could take any rock band’s album and weave a narrative through.

But also, it was a story we thought would be funny, whether we’re taking a swipe at anything or not.

[ENS] You’ve been a longtime proponent of D.I.Y. ethics, which has been especially evident in the choices you’ve made as a musician. How do you feel like D.I.Y. has held up over the years with musicians?

[TL] There are always people who are going to care about that and there are always people who aren’t. I know where I stand on things so it’s not something I feel super comfortable passing judgment on. I don’t begrudge anyone their right to feel differently and act accordingly. That said, as a music fan, I appreciate when people that I admire kind of retain their stick-to-itiveness as far as D.I.Y. goes. But there are also artists I admire who were never D.I.Y.

It’s kind of a pointless thing to try and explore forever – you have to do what you think is right and stand up for it. That’s why some of the bands that I talked about before have been great to encounter on the road because there’s a new spirit of “make it happen for yourself” D.I.Y. up there [in New Jersey] that’s really great.

[ENS] The song “Ativan Eyes” from your newest record, The Brutalist Bricks has the line, “the means of production are now in the hands of the workers.” This sort of theme is repeated throughout the song. Does this commentary have anything to do with the internet and file sharing as it relates to the music industry? Was it a statement for or against how these new methods of distribution relate to your D.I.Y. ethos?

[TL] It is a statement neither for nor against. It is a statement of fact that raises more questions. That’s one of the rare straight-up interpersonal relationship songs that I’ve written in my life. Within the context of that song, it’s more about how I don’t really know how it all falls down and [I’m] looking to just forget about it all on the couch with somebody [laughs].

[ENS] Did your feelings about these changes in the industry relate at all to your decision to have the band semi-retire, or at least drastically change the way you approach operation?

[TL] Well, that’s an objective issue, it’s not really how I feel about it. It’s more a question of money and time put into something versus how much time you have in your life and how much energy you have in your body. It’s just a fact that I just can’t operate things with the kind of energy, time, and money deficits I have in the past 20-plus years. This is something that everybody goes through at a certain point. Me talking about it on my website isn’t intended to be a “woe is me” thing, but I think [these issues aren’t] talked about realistically enough in the press, even by artists.

I think that there’s a lot of yammering that goes back and forth about the “changes in the industry” in the press, even by artists, but I rarely actually hear artists and record labels honestly talking about the nuts and bolts about what it means for them. Conceptually, we could go on and on forever, and that’s kind of what everybody does. And I don’t mean the RIAA or Sony saying, “We’re losing X number of millions of dollars in downloads every day.” I mean those who have dedicated their lives to D.I.Y. ethos and trying to keep things righteous having to choose whether to go against those principles in order to keep music as a full time thing or to change their lives and doing something else.

[ENS] So you’re essentially choosing the latter?

[TL] Well, yeah, I guess so for better or for worse. I don’t really have a choice in the matter for me. So I guess that’s right.

[ENS] Do you have any idea of what your life will look like or what the Pharmacists as a band will look like in the future at this point?

[TL] I don’t really know. I’m not going to stop making music. I’ll never stop making music, and I hope to keep making music with the guys I play with. It’s just a question of how can we accommodate it with other areas of our lives that we all need to start focusing on a little bit more.

[ENS] You’re known as a somewhat leftist political thinker and songwriter. Is your approach different in this post-Bush era, or is it the same struggle?

[TL] Not to imply that there’s no difference between Obama and Bush, because there certainly is and I’m glad we have Obama instead of McCain, but we are talking about major fundamental ideologies here. We live in a corporate world. It’s not even really capitalist, it’s like corporate socialism. Capitalist for the people who need the help and socialist for the people who don’t. There will always be something to sing about. There was before George W. Bush and there will be after. It’s not really a problem when you’re talking about the world’s governments today.

Interview by John Crowell @terriblesounds

Best Coast’s debut album, Crazy for You, was one of the most anticipated indie rock albums of 2010. However, by the time it came out in July, its role as a career marker for singer/songwriter Bethany Cosentino was almost academic. Buoyed by glowing praise from a host of internet blogs over a handful of singles distributed around the web, Best Coast became an underground household name. Between tours and festival appearances, Cosentino herself became a target for online hipster gossip and diatribes.
With an album release under their belts, Best Coast are touring the country and hoping to let their 60’s-inspired lovesick rock songs speak for themselves. Cosentino answered some questions for Each Note Secure as she and the rest of Best Coast entered rehearsals for the tour.

Best Coast will perform at the Topic Design Tent at Grammar’s as part of MidPoint Music Festival’s Thursday night showcase.

[Each Note Secure] Best Coast received a lot of attention before you even had a record out. Are your shows different now that people have had a chance to listen to your new album?

[Bethany Cosentino] Yeah it’s definitely different. It was strange doing headlining tours without ever having a record out. I think we feel more comfortable now on stage and touring and playing some of the sizes of venues we’re playing. We feel more comfortable as a band now that we have a record to support. Now people get more stoked for the songs off the record than they did for the [pre-album] singles because they have more of a product to get excited about.

When we were in Europe we did one show in London the day the record came out and then we did one show at Rough trade the day after it was released. Those are the only shows we’ve done since the record came out. We’re looking forward to doing the shows and the tour in the states because we’ve never toured with a record out. Having a drummer that lives on the other side of the country and touring all the time and not really being able to have actual practices makes it difficult to actually learn things. We’re going to try to use this time wisely and practice the record and learn some of the songs we haven’t played yet.

[ENS] I had a chance to see you at Pitchfork Fest this summer, and I was struck by the difference between the ultra-clean sound of your live show versus the more fuzzed-over sound of the record. Is there a reason for this sonic dichotomy?

[BC] We wanted the record to stray away from that whole lo-fi vibe that everybody is doing right now and have more of a produced sound. I don’t think the record is very fuzzy sounding … to an extent it is. But I think it sounds like a produced studio version of whatever we were doing before when were just doing things on our own. And obviously it’s really difficult to translate live. When we record we’re able to play like six different guitar parts […] and I can sing like six different harmonies. When we’re live and it’s just the three of us, we can’t really reproduce exactly what the record sounds like. But I think that when you go see a band and they sound exactly like their record and you’re watching them just thinking “I could honestly close my eyes and feel like I’m at home listening to the record,” it can get a little boring. I think it’s more interesting to see what bands do differently [live].

Also, like I said before, we haven’t really had a chance as a three piece band to really practice and focus on what we’re doing since we’ve been touring basically since March […] we’re definitely not unhappy with the live show but we’ll be taking the time off to practice and get the songs to sound a little bit more like the record.

[ENS] Being a band touring in support of a brand new album, how do you feel about this new era of internet domination as a means of music press and distribution?

[BC] I feel a little half and half about it. Half of me feels like it’s really awesome that the internet can take these bands that no one’s ever really heard of and put them on a website like Pitchfork that every single person reads and all of a sudden they’re touring and have a record. I think that the internet can really make a band. I think that before the existence of Myspace and blogs that it was a lot more difficult for bands… you kind of had to be one of those bands where you recorded a demo, went to shows, and handed it out.

And people still do that; we get demos all the time on tour. I think it’s now an internet age, though. That kind of freaked me out for a while because there’s so much going on on the internet and once you become a band that people have a connection with in the beginning […] as soon as you get attention from bigger blogs or bigger magazines people are like, “I don’t like that band because I don’t feel like they’re mine anymore and I felt like they were mine in the beginning. “

So the internet can be a really great thing but it can also create a lot of nasty backlash that people don’t really deserve or want to deal with. So I don’t really know how I feel about the internet, I kind of have a love/hate relationship with it. I’ve been trying in the last month to have an internet detox and not really go on the internet as much, but it’s really fucking hard man! My generation grew up using the internet so it’s something we’re really dependent on now. It’s like I can’t go an hour without checking my email. It makes me sick sometimes and makes me think I just wish the internet would go away! [Laughs]

[ENS] Speaking of annoying parts of internet hype, it seems comments about your reported relationship with Nathan Williams of Wavves constantly go hand in hand with stories about Best Coast. I even heard a lot of yelled requests for Wavves songs when you played at Pitchfork. Does all this talk get annoying?

[BC] It does, because I don’t think it’s really relevant to what either one of us are doing. People seem to think, “Oh, they’re both in bands, they must have met at a show,” or, “They’re dating because they’re both in these sort of similar bands,” or whatever. When really, I have to explain to people that that’s not true, that we’ve known each other for five years, that he’s one of my closest friends… it’s just not anybody’s business.

I just feel like when you’re under the scope in a way, people care about your music but they also care more about what’s going on in your personal life like who you’re dating and what you do on your downtime. That’s just weird for me, and nothing that I ever really want to talk about. I would never deny that he’s my boyfriend, but it’s not relevant to my music or my career, or his music or his career. I feel like what happens behind closed doors needs to stay behind closed doors.

[ENS] I remember seeing a video of you and Freddie Gibbs smoking weed posted on Pitchfork a few months back. Do you think your use of marijuana influences your music at all?

[BC] I just smoke weed because I’m an anxious person and when I smoke weed it makes me less anxious and less self-conscious. I’ve been smoking weed since I was a teenager and I’ve always done it for pretty much the same reason; it’s always been a self-medication kind of a thing. When I smoke weed it makes me feel like I can deal with how stressed out I am. It’s easier to write a record or write a bunch of songs or whatever if I’m high… it’s weird because for some people it makes them really paranoid or like they can’t do anything, but for me it makes me feel like I can do anything.

Sometimes I smoke weed and I feel like, “Wait a minute, I can’t even get off the couch.” But I think that idea of laziness and isolation comes into my lyrics a lot. Sometimes when I’m really stoned and I’m by myself feeling really lazy and bored or whatever I take that feeling and put it into a song. I don’t think weed influences me, but I think the calmer person weeds makes me makes it easier for me to write music. It’s also something that it’s in my daily life – I guess it’s just a part of who I am. I’m obviously not afraid to talk about it, I talk about it all the time!

[ENS] People make a lot of your 60’s pop influences, but I also hear a lot of 90’s rock in your songs. Do you anticipate touching on any other decades in your future work?

[BC] I think my most obvious and talked-about influence is the Beach Boys. I think I attempt to take the vibe of the Beach Boys and try to create a more modern kind of sound. I’m also really inspired by Nirvana, Hole, Pavement, and other 90’s indie rock bands. Best Coast has really only been a band for a year, and those were the things I was heavily influenced by during that year. I know that I always want Best Coast to have that throwback to the 60’s, grungy 90’s feel, but I don’t doubt that as time goes on and I grow as a songwriter, we grow as a band, travel more, and my life changes that things will sound different.

-Interview by John Crowell @terriblesounds