Join me as I talk to record producer, Brian Paulson. We discuss his adventures producing Wilco, Son Volt, Uncle Tupelo, Slim Dunlap, Slint, Archers of Loaf and more. We touch on his relationships with Jeff Tweedy, Steve Albini, Peter Jesperson, Bob Mould and others. Great talk, great records!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:27):
You are listening to the Figure Eights podcast. I'm your host,
Nick Leak from the band High on Stress so of Minneapolis, Minnesota,
and I appreciate you listening to the show. You may
have realized the last episode that we had here a
few weeks back with Dan Murphy from Soul Asylum, and
it had been about two years since the episodes before that,
(00:48):
so it was really great. It's a really great response
to that episode with Dan, and really enjoyed that conversation
and appreciate all the night sports about it. It's good
to be back once again. It won't be weekly, will
be coming as it comes. You know, we've got to
write songs, play music, do all the things that you
do in this world, but we will have them from
(01:08):
time to time and I appreciate you tuning in to listen.
So this episode we've got Brian Halson. He's a music
producer behind such amazing records Wilco Am Sunbold, Trace, Uncle
Tublow and Dine Archers of Low Magna Pop. He did
(01:28):
production work on Beck's Total A record and as well
as one Dear to Me Here Slim Dunlaps for solo
record The Old New News. So thank you for listening,
and without further ado, I give you Brian Haulson.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
I didn't realize sound crappy. These MacBook cameras were. Well.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
The good news is I only use the audio anyway,
Thank goodness. The ease of conversation. So you're here in
stocks are safe?
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Yeah? They I made sure they're blue. By the way.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
Okay, it's good to know, good to know. Where are
you at? Are you in North Carolina? Is that where
I saw that you lived there?
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah? I live in Durham. I've lived here for seven years,
eight years now, eight years. Moved to North Carolina from
Minneapolis in ninety five. Okay, mostly lived in Chapel Hill, Incarborough. Nice.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
Which part of Minnesota did you grow up? Was it?
But Midgee? Did I see that somewhere?
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Yeah? I did.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
Nice. You don't sound too excited about Bumigie.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
I was well. Once my mother moved to the Minneapolis,
I was eager to follow. I was still in I
think seventh or eighth grade when that happened, and I'd
visit during the summers and I was I was kind
of ready, but they wanted to send me to South
High and I wasn't into South High.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
Only visited, Butmidgee nice place to visit.
Speaker 2 (02:54):
But I grew up.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
I grew up in a small area in North Dakota,
so I definitely you can really Yeah, it's a nice
little town to grow open, but you got to get
out of there at some point, right.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Yeah, it did feel like that I didn't quite fit
in there.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
What kind of a kid were you?
Speaker 2 (03:14):
I was an only kid. I kept myself mostly, but
I was friends with everybody. I was friends with the hoodlums,
I was friends with the jocks. I was friends with,
you know, just about everybody a friend of mine at work.
And I kind of term where we will consider ourselves
serial tribalists.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
I can very much relate to that.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
Yeah, I seemed to be continuing that trend. I've taken
it since COVID. I've definitely taken inventory of people that
aren't near and dear to me, and I make sure
stay in touch with them. But I'm pretty bad about it.
I mean, it was just a nature, especially like moving
into a record making for thirty years, It's like it's
(03:57):
just sort of the nature of the beast. You know,
friends or whoever you're in the room.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
With, right, and there's a lot of time in the
room and a lot of yeah, personalities that you have
to somehow navigate. So I suppose you kind of learned
to get along with.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
You get to know people really fast. It's intense and
there's nothing quite like that intensity. You know.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Yeah, were you a guitar player growing up or what
was what was your yaw?
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Well? Yeah, I started playing violin in the fifth grade,
I think, and then I played I did that until
I was in ninth grade, when I played like all
State orchestra in the summertime, which was great, but that
wasn't enough to keep me entertained. And then I think,
and then my uncle gave me my first He gave
(04:43):
me a kind of a beater I've been as a
classical guitar that he had that he wasn't using. And
that was the kind of the violin is like kind
of cobbling together three fingers and playing black Sabbaths.
Speaker 1 (04:56):
What was your entry to guitar? Usually there's you know,
you get your deep purple and there a lot.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
Of people yeah, oh yeah, and you get smoke in
the water is essential one o one one symptom of
the universe. Flack savage, that kind of stuff you're like, hey,
I can do this, this is fun. But yeah, I
mean it's like and also it's like by the time
I was in ninth grade, it's just like, well, one,
it's like the going from playing state wide Orchestra, from
(05:20):
playing like Sibelius and Mozart and going back to like
Bimidge High School and then playing like bread covers and
of cabbages and kings. I just couldn't. It just wasn't
fulfilling in any way.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
Did you run into other kids that were playing guitar
or you just.
Speaker 2 (05:38):
Oh yeah, yeah, No. I got into all kinds of
crazy trouble in the latter part of well, from ninth
grade on, you know, substances were discovered. No, yeah, yeah,
we I mean we just I mean, nothing really much
happened in that realm. I mean I was like I
was a stereo head, you know. It's like I was
really into like, uh, buying weird records. I got into
(06:01):
that by about ninth grade. It's like I remember, like
I think part of my ninth grade I think it
was eighth or ninth grade social studies class was we'd
beat we were just supposed to read the newspaper for
like fifteen minutes in the morning, and I remember reading
I think it was about the sex pistols and like
moving like traveling through the Dallas Airport and just like
(06:22):
all the commotion. It was like ruckus that they're like
causing and I looked at them. I was like, that
looks interesting. It's like I went from you know, like
my America Records and my Elo Records everything that changed everything,
you know, so I started I'd have to go to
Natural Music, the hippie record store and in Bimidgie and
(06:45):
order all these weird records, and it was there was
something great about like, you know, having to order a
record and actually having to wait. You know, there was
just like this there was this excitement. It's like I
couldn't wait to get home from high school, like to
pick up my records that I ordered like two weeks ago,
you know.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
I you know, I remember doing that with like Columbia
House Records, right you Yeah, hear a song that you liked,
didn't get the album, and then you had to it's
gonna be here any day now.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sometimes like seeing at more than retail crap.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
I'm pretty sure every kid in the universe probably had
an unpaid bill to Columbia House somewhere. Yeah, that's funny.
So what were some of those bands that you were
picking those records up in ordering? Beside sex Pistles?
Speaker 2 (07:30):
It was like, yeah, sex Pistols. I mean I got
into like that first wave of the English punk rock,
like the Vibrators, Stranglers, what else, the weird one before
punk rock, and I like them just because they were
different and it was just sort of my my band
in ninth grade because it was just different. Was Bbop Delocks?
(07:50):
What did I see in this? It's just I mean,
I don't get it. Some of it's all right, but
I was like, I don't know why I bought all
those records in myso investment in it other than I
was just being you know, a contry.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
Love that band.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
Yeah, I mean there's things about them that are they're cool,
but it's like, yeah, I look back at a lot
of that like Glund stuff, and it's like the theater
element could be could have been dialed down a notch
and a lot of that stuff Bowie included, you know.
I mean, it's like Bowie was great. He's like he
treaded that line of theater and like like and experimental
music pretty well, but there's times where it was just like, yeah,
(08:25):
this isn't much different than Godspell.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
So did you end up planning in a band while
you were up there, did you know?
Speaker 2 (08:33):
I mean I had some like derelict friends that I'd
get together with and we'd like hang on their parents'
garage and like make a racket, but it was never
there wasn't there. Yeah, there just weren't enough. Nobody really
had their there the shipped together enough to have like
an actual like drum kit or a guitar, and yeah,
it's just there wasn't and there wasn't an outlet for
(08:56):
it really, you know. It was just like, yeah, we'd
get together and like a guitar and kind of bashed
through cars, covers and things like that. But yeah, that
didn't really happen until I moved to Minneapolis, when that
happened slowly. But yeah, yeah, Like going back to the
record stuff, it's like that branched out into like, oh yeah,
I remember getting Talking Heads and seventy seven and the
(09:18):
first Gang of Four record at like I think it
was it wasn't called hotle Likes at the time. It
was the one that done on seventh and nannaupin Ah. God,
what was it called back then? Maybe it was hot
like still then. But yeah, I remember getting those records
and I was just sort of like puzzled. I didn't
really I mean, I didn't dislike it, but it was
just like it wasn't there was no point of reference
(09:39):
for it. So it was it's like the other stuff,
just like they're just like snotty rock and roll records.
It wasn't really that much with Jump, but I was
into being progressive. Yeah, but the one that really popped
my mind was like seeing DVA on Saturday Night Live
and that that really just popped my cork.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
Yeah, just unlike anything else to come before.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
Yeah. No, And I still watch that and it's like
I my my partner's sister saw it and she's like,
that's weird. I'm like, yeah, in this day and age,
it's still something completely other. And I really like that
about them at the time.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
It's funny because I have a couple of kids, and
you know, I was introduced them to different music. Tonight.
It was I was showing my ten year old daughter
the Fleetwood Max Silver Springs thing and explaining the whole
Lindsay Buckingham, she was like kind of cool. Yeah, yeah,
so she was kind of speaking of theater right exactly.
(10:39):
But it's just funny to think about because usually when
you go back on some of these bands, you have
to say, like, you know, for the time, this was
really kind of amazing or shocking or nothing. But like
the Goo yeah whatever, this is not shocking. But I'm
like Devo still. If you see that, you're like, what
a bizarre band?
Speaker 2 (10:58):
Divo? Yeah No, And it's like I had artsy inclinations
and that had all of it, you know, and it's
like I wanted to be Devo. It was it was the.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
Whole package, get the flower pot, the theater.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Was right, you know. I mean yeah, it was like
I can't think it was letter bangs. I basically called
them kiss for college kids, and he was right, but
you know, I wasn't in college yet I didn't care.
It was like it was the yellow suits. Man. They
did me in the leisure suits too. After that were good,
but then after I kind of lost track after the
first couple of records. Yeah, but once once I was vindicated,
all my high school square like friends started listening to
(11:32):
Whip It, I was like, all right, my job's done.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Next I'm moving along culture.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
Yes, now I'm into discharge and Prince.
Speaker 1 (11:46):
Hell, I've got there. You go, well, what's that got the.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Oh nice, Wow, that's a good one. That's a good
choice of tattoo. I never thought about that.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
Yeah, Prince is my that was by it as a
kid where it was the first music that I heard
and that I was like, holy cow. Then it was
the Beatles.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Yeah, dirty Mind was really caught me. And I was like,
I mean because it was like that's when he started
hanging out First Avenue and was picked like ripping off
Lawyer Barbaro's style and like punking it up just a
little bit, you know. That that caught my attention. And
then I was living with a guy named Chris Tack
at the time, and he used to play in the
a band called Nakarima who played up in Northeast with
(12:29):
like Grand Central and all that. He was a horn player. Wow.
But I remember I was living with I lived with
him for like a year and a half and he
got a call from Mark Brown was who was in
Nakarima with him or no Grand Central, I can't remember,
but they were bandmates. But he was like, hey, I
just got a gig with Prince. He went like, you
want to come down and see me. I'm like, we're
playing at First Avenue. I'm like, my roommate invited me.
(12:51):
It was for the it was a rehearsal show, like
unnounced rehearsal show for controversy, and I was not prepared
for I mean, I liked those records, but it was
just like I was mind blown. I had no idea,
Like how fucking could he was.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
There's nobody else like that now really like he took
pieces of what other people could do, but that whole
package together was unlike anybody.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
It's funny I work at UNC now and that there's
some people I know that work at the Southern Historical
Collection which are like Doug. I mean, they keep like
special collections of all like you know, like old like
slave owner material, blah blah blah. But it's it's it's
an amazing collection. But one of the curate of the
assistant curators there's like how it's like Prince should have
(13:39):
been from Durham, Minneapolis. I don't get it. I'm like sorry,
I mean, if he wasn't, if he wasn't Durham. That
wouldn't have been the same thing. You know, it's like
Atlanta whatever. It's like, yeah, you would think he should
have come from the South. I mean, I guess Andre
three thousand, it's a good argument for similar but it's like,
but Andre three thousand would have been Andre three thousand
(13:59):
with Prince. But it's just something about that environment in
Minnesota that like, Yeah, I mean there's it's hard to
know where all that came from. I mean, and I'm
to this day grateful that that happened under like one roof,
because I mean I wouldn't. It didn't dawn me until
like what probably about when he like just before he died.
That without that going on, I don't think anybody would
(14:24):
have paid attention to what was going on in Minneapolis. Yeah,
it's like replacement Schoosker Dupe, they all. I mean, the
spotlight was on that club.
Speaker 1 (14:33):
Yeah, it's pretty amazing. Did you ever get to meet
the guy?
Speaker 2 (14:37):
I would run into him frequently at First Avenue, But
it's like, like somebody just asked me that recently. I
was like, but meet now, But I mean it's like
you would run into him. He kept to himself. I
mean he was really only interested in, you know, the girls.
You didn't really hang out with the dudes. You know.
It's like, yeah, it's like, yeah, I I remember crashing.
(15:01):
We crashed into each other at the like he was
coming up the stairs and I was going downstairs at
the First Avenue one night, just like like we smashed
right into each other and he's like, excuse me. He
just sort of like minted ground in his bolt high
heels and went upstairs. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
I stood next to him a few times, but I
just couldn't get myself to say anything because I was
it was.
Speaker 2 (15:19):
Like his vibe was so intimidating. It's like it was
a tiny guy, but it was like I don't know
what that what possessed that body, but it was a
force to be reckoned with.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
Yeah, and I And for me it was like just
being a fan since I was like four, I'm like,
what if he says something that I don't like? Yeah,
because you'd always hear the stories, like as you were
saying women when I was being like he was just
the sweetest, and then you would hear somebody else it
wasn't a woman. We're like have a not so great story. Yeah, Yeah,
(15:52):
I like your new album, what's your point? You're like,
I don't really want that vibe, So I'm like, I'm
just gonna enjoy the fact that somebody who doesn't seem
like they're actual human being is just walking down the
hall right now. That's bizarre.
Speaker 2 (16:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
Yeah, So how did you get into bands? How did
you meet the bands?
Speaker 2 (16:09):
It was all just I mean, I my intent, Like
I started out like once I left a midgie, I
had a I got into AMCAD. My intention was to
you know, get a degree, start making album covers. I
was really into album art, specifically the seventies coming out
of England called hypnosis, like storm Time and that stuff.
(16:33):
It was like really, I mean I was basically ripping
them off. That's how I got into arts school. But
in that like that was in nineteen eighty and right
around that, I was hanging out at Orfolk Daily. Of
course at that point that because I was a hard
not yeah, I mean it's like calling through the usbins
and like having them hold way too many records for
(16:53):
me all the time. But but yeah, I mean through
those people, I started going to like Jay's Long or Zoogies.
At the it wasn't the Longhorn anymore to see the
replacements and new screw and L seven three, which was
you know, it was left of It was Chris Osgood's
next thing, and yeah, I just started meeting people like
crazy and it just caught me. And m KAD was
(17:19):
kind of in a weird point of flux at that
point in time, and it's like I really wanted to
get into video and Litho they were really pushing me
towards design because I needed to make money blah blah blah,
and also there's just so much infighting with the faculty
and staff there. I was just I just like, I'm
just gonna take a year off and hang out in
this music thing. So I just started going out and
it's like the vibe was like really good friends with
(17:42):
Terry Katzman at the time, and through him I met
Bob mauld and everybody else from there on, and then
probably the biggest one was Chris Johnson from Rifle Sport
and then you know the Man's Eyes guys, and it's like, yeah,
I just ended up like hanging out with the Chris
Rifle Sport guys a lot, and then living with Pete
and Gerard for a while. And through them. I met
(18:05):
through Chris, I met the Man Sized guys, and then
just one day went over to practice with Chris and
drank Beert those guys, and Tony was like, strap on
a guitar, and it's like I just happened to know
all the songs already because Bob was well, Bob had
been working on the their first record, and I mean
it's like I was just sort of playing along. He's like,
I can to do this stuff. But it's like, yeah,
I sat down with them one night and Tony was like,
(18:26):
why don't you join the band? I was like, Okay, you.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
Just love those like early life decisions. That sounds like something.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
Yeah, yeah, of course, yeah, you're in a recording studio
making a record.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
I mean it was It's funny to think about, how
I mean, it seemed like a long time at the time,
but it really wasn't you. It was like all that
happened in just a few years. It's it's crazy, just
how long in Man Size. Yeah. Uh, that's a good
question because it was on again, off again. I mean
(19:03):
Tony had had like left to go back to school
right around the time. I mean that decision was made
right like it was terrible because it's like, you know,
like Homestead essentially was putting it out and we had
to tell Gerard Cosloy that, well, we've been telling them
that we were breaking up until after the record came up.
(19:27):
But yeah, it was unfortunate timing. But yeah, but then
it's like, yeah, we got back together after I think
after because I think he had beenished school after a
year maybe, and we started playing out again for a while,
and I don't remember how long that lasted. But it's
just like it wasn't it was the dynamic wasn't quite
as explosive. It's like, I mean I was hung up
(19:49):
because like all that stuff was just like it just
that second EP that I made them was it was
just so easy that stuff just like kind of fell
out of the ether. And then the second time it's
like I don't know if I had some kind of
block and I just couldn't come up with stuff anymore. Yeah,
I don't know what it was. It wasn't that it
was like amazing or anything like that, but I think
(20:11):
I was just overthinking it or something. I don't know.
It just it just never quite Nothing that we came
up after that was quite worthwhile.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
I don't know, was that kind of the end of
the band at that point.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
Yeah, yeah, and then people are just sort of like,
you know, Tippy lost interest. I mean, we all lost
interested various points, and we just sort of drifted. But
we'd still come back Creaking Bean and play together every
now and then. But it's like it's yeah, we couldn't
get it together to do anything more beyond that. And
then Tony and I got into We're in Breaking Circus
for a while. It's like, yeah, it's like because we
(20:44):
were tight with that whole Chicago scene like Rifle, sport Man, Sized,
Naked Rega and Big Black, it's like that that network
was started.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
I actually had an Albedi on here at one point.
That was a fun conversation.
Speaker 2 (20:57):
Yeah. Now I owe a lot to him too. It's
just like I know a lot to like Terry Katzman,
Chris Johnson, uh, Bob Mold, Steve Albini. I mean it's like, well,
lout Steve, I wouldn't have been able to navigate well.
And Pizzotti Jeff Pizotti a certain point too. It's like
Jeff Pizotti was sort of like the first person from
(21:18):
Chicago that I was not intimidated by. He was actually
really open and friendly and made Chicago seem more liberal
than it actually was. It was I mean, I was,
I mean I had I had a pretty healthy dose
of anxiety in the eighties, and it's like when Chicago
just terrified me, New York City terrified me too for
the first few times I went. And it's like, and
(21:39):
you don't have money and there were no credit cards
or cell phones or anything.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
So yikes, yikes. Yeah, how did you get into the
studio work?
Speaker 2 (21:50):
That's like I got into that. It's like the first
time I saw got into that was like when Bob
Mold didn't a rifle sport ep that never came out.
I don't know what happened to those recordings, but it
was essentially the same thing that was Voice of Reason
their first record. But they did it the children's theater
studio liked the eight track up in the children's theater, okay,
(22:14):
and that was pretty cool. I mean, that's like I
remember that. I don't know if they ever officially mixed that.
But then I don't know, for some reason, they just
decided to go to Black Gray Way and do it
for real. I mean, just help it because for whatever reason.
But that was the first time I like hearing like
full three to somebody, like people that I knew making music,
(22:35):
like in like hearing full three dimensional sound playback coming
over the speakers and just like and me being a
seventies stereo like kid, it was just like, oh, wow,
I know what I want to do.
Speaker 3 (22:48):
It.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
Yeah, that was it. Yeah, that was really it. And
then and then yeah I wasn't. I wasn't there for
the Man's side first Man Sized Recordings. I didn't know
them yet then, but then well yeah, by the time
I got into the studio with them for their second
their second EP, it's like I was elbows up to
the board and probably I mean, I had a lot
of ideas. I'd read Mix Magazine and I knew it
(23:09):
digital delays were from reading that, and I knew what
gated reaverb was and all this stuff, and I just
had ideas of things that I wanted to try out
and apply to the second the set of Man Sized recordings,
And I'm sure I drove Steve's Felstead crazy because I
wanted the board and I was like, let's do this,
let's do this. I'm hear it let me do this,
just I don't know why I didn't. I just sort
(23:30):
of had an instinct for it. But it's like, I'm
not I wasn't schooled in it by any chance, by
any means, never was. I mean, I had intended to
go after I had kind of gotten into that. I
had intentions of going to New York too. There was
a place called the Institute of Audio Research that I
was curious about going to. But then it's just like
(23:51):
I never got around to it, and I just got busy
like working and doing it being in music. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
Yeah, So I it was funny because I've the way
your name came up for this. I don't know if
you listened to the Dan Murphy episode that I just
did a few, Yeah, I check that out. Yeah. So
the funny thing is, so I started this in twenty
twenty when no one could do anything, including myself. So
I'm like, wow, something to do. And I had your
(24:18):
name on a on a notebook piece of paper because
I'm like, I should find that guy and reach out
and see if he wants to do this, And then,
you know, didn't get around to it, and then Dan
mentioned you on that episode. A couple of weeks ago,
and I'm like, oh, yeah, and then you will. Then
you liked my post about it, and I'm like, well,
there he is, tracked him down. Here we are now,
(24:38):
so here we are now. So yeah, he was mentioning you,
I think you had done the original Runaway Train demo
for that when they.
Speaker 2 (24:46):
First Yeah, I mixed while you were out, sort of
co produced with with Chris Osgod, and I feel like
somebody else was in on that. Maybe it was just
Chris and fells Dead. But then yeah, but then they
for some reason they wanted me to mix it. I
(25:07):
don't know why, but I did. Ended up redoing a
couple of things that they weren't quite one hundred percent
happy with, but it's like yeah, and then yeah, we
did demos for once their a M contract. So we
did a bunch of like demos for which essentially this
is all the stuff that the begame Runaway Train, and
(25:28):
they were all very acoustic based, and I was I
was really trying to convince them just like just release
this as it is and run with the money, but
you know, they didn't want to do that. They wanted
a big record deal. They ended up being the right choice.
Speaker 1 (25:41):
Yeah, hell worked out for him.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
I would say it did. Long term maybe not, but
for the instant a lot of cash.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
It did, Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
He mentioned that your demo of it sounded very similar
to the one that actually came out.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
In some regards maybe, but the drum sound probably wasn't
as quite as nineties probably right.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
So you also did Slim Dunlaps first record as well,
the old name. I noticed that when I was looking
at it, So tell me about that. How did you
start working with Slim?
Speaker 2 (26:16):
That was born out of my relationship with Peter Jasperson.
I've done it, I guess at that point it's like
I was working for one of the Raycho disc people
at the time, Rob Simon's who had done east Side Digital.
I was working at the east Side Digital ESD thing,
(26:37):
which almost went under and is a part of like
trying to get the company back a float after Best
Buy like Crusted Us with Christmas returns. One year, He's like, hey,
I'll give you guys, I'll split the profits with you
guys if you can, like you get your sales up
to a certain point. And of course that was the
year that Recover released the started releasing the Bowie stuff.
(26:57):
So it wasn't really a problem to get the company
back about but we so he we got bonuses out
of that, and with those bonuses, I bought like uh,
an Otari eight track and an Amex scorpion board, just
in some micro handful of microphones to start, like well,
to hopefully make my own stuff. I'm still working on that.
That never happened, uh, But then yeah, that's that ended
(27:22):
up being like set up in the warehouses that Richo
we're in for quite a while and I just would
like I'd work there during the days and then at
five o'clock all the microphones and recording gear would come
out and we just started doing like I have. I
did a Joe Henry record up there short Man's Room,
and I think that's when Peter sort of realized it's like, oh,
(27:44):
this is cheaper than going to BlackBerry or and they
saw other stuff and this stuff sounds pretty good. So
I did a couple of medium cool records when he
was doing that, and then yeah, it was just he
wanted me to work on Slim's record too.
Speaker 1 (27:58):
Yeah, so Slim before the Stroke, my band High on Stress.
He asked us to back him on some shows for
his backing band. So yeah, it was really fun. But
I was trying to convince him at that time. I'm like,
you need the third solo record. When you're going to
do the third solo record, and he's like, I record weird.
So I was going to ask you, does he record weird?
(28:18):
I don't.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
It's hard to know. I mean, I don't. I think
he was writing a lot onto sort of Paul's sort
of style of tension at that point in time. It's like,
it doesn't, it didn't. He liked things that were born
out of like chaos intension, and I don't know if
(28:41):
that was like, if that's what he meant by being heir.
It was a style. It wasn't. It wasn't that was
for me. But it's like and also it's like, yeah,
he cast intention, but he also needed guidance, and after
a while he was just frustrated because like nobody was
giving him guidance. And I finally was just like, all right,
here I go, I'm die giving you guidance and just
(29:03):
kind of coax them through things, push them through, and
it took him a while. I think the only reason
we actually got that one finished is because Jesus. I
think I was three months into it at least, and
so it was just like it just seemed like one
of those things that was just going to go on
forever and then things will get worse in the future.
(29:26):
Three months that's nothing, but what I got a call
from Uncle Tupla at that point in time for their
Warner Brothers debut. They wanted to interview me for that,
and then I went to Chicago, interviewed them, accepted the offer,
and then all of a sudden there was a deadline
for Slim. I was like, I got to go do this.
It's like, if you want to, if you want, I'm
(29:46):
not going to be able to help you beyond this date.
And that's I think that's Without that happening, I don't
know how we would have finished. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:55):
I think sometimes people just need that deadline to feel
the crunch to get things done.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
There.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
I know a ton of people like that were even
working on the same album for ten years. It's like,
you just gotta just gotta get it done, make it.
Speaker 2 (30:07):
Yeah, it's it's it's hard. I mean out I know,
it's like I haven't done anything since forty some years ago,
and it's like I put it around a lot here,
but it's like there's no deadlines, there's no demand. It's
just sort of like now I'm just treated like that's
just therapy.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
It's fine, That's kind of what it is anyway. But yeah,
it really was that and a Dyne that you did.
Yeah record, Okay, And what was that like? Is that
was that their last? No? Yeah, that was their last record?
Speaker 2 (30:35):
That was it? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (30:37):
So what was that like in the studio at that time,
because obviously things got a little it was on that tour.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
It was interesting because it's like, yeah, I mean I
think that tension existed, but I was naive. Uh it was.
I mean it was great because I mean they were
they wanted to. I mean, I loved I. It wasn't
completely sold on the first two records, but I really
liked March. I liked the acoustic approach on that. I
(31:03):
don't know why it resonated with me. I think it's
just at that point in time, I was really getting
tired of like the sort of macho manliness that like
was coming out of Chicago and just like negative negativity
and like edge lord shit, you know.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
It was a little bit a little bit different vibe
at that time than yeah, and it's like and that
started to creep into the minneapoliscene too, and it just
sort of bummed me out.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
I was just like, man, it was like, these bands
are good before this crept in. It's like, I don't
dislike that stuff, but not everything has to be like that.
So like, the opportunity to work on an acoustic string
band seemed like the perfect punk rock thing to do. Yeah,
in response to all the edge Lord takeover and Yeah,
(31:46):
it's like I got there and they they wanted to
return to Uncle Tuople, wanted to return to making a
rock record. It's like they wanted to get back to it.
Like it it's like it was all a lot of
loud guitars blah blah blah. But unfortunately the studio we
went to in Austin, Texas wasn't really big enough to
accommodate that. It was pretty tight. I mean, we could have,
but it's like I just for some reason I couldn't.
I wasn't pumped about like how things were sounding in
(32:08):
that format. And then I'd be like, all right, just
give me a break. I'm gonna move I'm gonna move
stuff around like I was trying to reconfigure stuff so
like the Bleed made sense and situated people that needed
to be isolated differently. And I'd be doing that and
then i'd go into the lounge or I'd be like
just going run through stuff in lounge, and I go
in the lounge and they'd be running through its string
band style. I'd be like, hang on a second, this
(32:31):
sounds way better than what you're trying to do there
as a rock band. I mean, it's like, can we
please try this string band stuff? And it's like, I mean,
Jay wasn't pumped on that someways. I mean, I think
the only the one that I really kind of regret
pushing that on was probably sixteen Keys. Yeah, it's it's
it works, but I mean I think it probably would
have been better as a rock song, but the majority
(32:53):
of the material sounded so much better like string band style.
Speaker 1 (32:57):
Did you get much pushback from them trying to get
towards that direction.
Speaker 2 (33:02):
No? Surprisingly, I mean as I got to know them more. Surprisingly, No,
because I don't know what it was they were willing
to be pushed and not And I mean, and it's
weird for me. It's like that's usually not my styles
to push for. I mean, we were both a comedy
like being polite. I guess I wasn't being polite by pushing,
(33:25):
but it's I just like was just saying what I heard.
I mean, I just liked what I was hearing in
the lounge of the studio more than what I like
hearing or coming across the speakers. Ginas our junior style.
Speaker 1 (33:38):
That would have been a much different record that way,
that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (33:41):
Yeah, yeah, no, it really would have. I mean, well
you get you get some of it. It's like like
we've been had as got like the rock like sloppy
rock vibe, and it's just like, yeah, something about Jay's numbers.
They just weren't breathing right. And I think part of
that might have been just like, uh, it was Ken
Komer's first go with him, and it's like, and this
(34:03):
is something I learned much later that uh, you know,
Kuomer was definitely a loud drummer, and something I noticed
after working with Mike Hydorn on Sunball Records is that
he sort of followed Jay. He wasn't leading Jay, he
wasn't setting a bed for Jay to play on. He
was following Jay's right hand. It's sort of like how
(34:25):
Spencer Tweedy plays with Jeff Tweety. It's just like there's
this natural synergy between like the their internal rhythms and
it just works. And Ken didn't like Ken's great, but
that that that's synergy of like following Jay's right hand
just wasn't there, and I didn't know to look for
that at the time.
Speaker 1 (34:43):
Yeah, new drummers could change the ballgame completely.
Speaker 2 (34:46):
Yeah. No, I mean we got it to work, but
it took. It just took some doing, you know.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
Yeah, So how long did that record take?
Speaker 2 (34:54):
That was only like two or three weeks recording and mixing.
I mean it was I mean we we we said
very punk rocket ethos and like it was, there was
all live. There were zero puncheons, zero overdups. I mean
that was That's what made it like a little easier.
Speaker 1 (35:11):
Do you typically record more live.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Or yeah, it depends, it depends. I've been through the
gamut of all that. And at the end of the day,
I mean I haven't been in the studio or made
a record in like seven years now since I started
working at uncause it was just too hard to balance.
But it's like I was really I mean, especially as
you know, things like the availability of doing it yourself
(35:36):
at home and driving yourself bananas became a thing, a
foundation of just some sort of human interplay I think
is crucial to any kind of energy in it, like
any kind of music that like is a band quote unquote.
I mean it's like give and take because like it's
getting in and polishing everything up like piece by piece.
(35:58):
It's just it's hard to get it to feel right. Ever,
you know, you can get it nice. But but yeah,
just like finding the right elements to get like some
give and take in a live, live environment. Really it's
so helpful.
Speaker 1 (36:13):
Well, some producers don't, Like they'll tell the artists don't
even demo anything like come in here and let's figure
it out. Are you that way or do you feel
like you get.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
You know, that's that's a tough call too. I mean,
I think it depends on the musicianship and people that
are open to the process. I think, now, yeah, given
given the it really depends on the people involved in
what they're after. I mean, given my brothers, I would
probably try both ways and not be labor I mean,
the main thing is not to belabor anything. Ever, you know,
(36:44):
keep things moving, don't don't ever get hung up. If
you're hung up and you're stuck and you're polishing a
tured why that's not fun.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
The worst record my band has ever made was the
one we were the most prepared for. And I always
remember that because we're interesting. Tempo's gonna be you know,
we're gonna go one twenty, we're gonna lock that in,
we're gonna practice to it, and just there is.
Speaker 2 (37:06):
Something about capturing that moment of discovery and it's it's,
I don't know what it is. It's like they like
there's a golden small record or like the last one
I did with them that had oh, since you came along? Yeah,
what was that called? Anyways, carry Lewis on? But until
(37:27):
you came along something I've got him from blanking on
the name of it.
Speaker 3 (37:31):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (37:32):
But there was a sloppy earlier take of that that
I just loved and they were just not having it. Yeah.
I tried to get Dickinson, Jim Dickinson to convince them
that that was the better take than the one that
We're there. Just like everything was just like really locked
down tight, you know, it's just like never bought it
I think they've realized a little later with like the
charms of the original like scrappy take.
Speaker 1 (37:56):
It's hard to let that stuff go because now I
know I could do that better, but like most of
the time that's a better take, it's more interesting to
listen to.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
Yeah, it's been a really that kind of thing has
been a real learning experience for me, just like kind
of puttering around my own home here. It's like, since
I I keep myself entertained, it's like I should have
done this so long ago, but I was always busy
engineering and producing. But it's like it would have helped
me with being like more empathetic with the other side
of the glass. But it's like just like yeah, just
like really seeing what works and what doesn't, and really
(38:27):
learning not to be too precious about things and not
getting hung up on my new show. It's like so
important not to go down those holes. Right.
Speaker 1 (38:35):
So obviously Tupelo loved the record you made because they
you know, once they split up, you made the first
sun Volt and the first Welcome record, right, so yeah.
Speaker 2 (38:44):
That was that was the end. I actually made one
more day, that's right.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
Yeah, Yeah, you made the two first two sun volts, right,
and then the first.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
Yeah, but I was trying to do the right thing
and you be all corporate and get a lawyer and
stuff like that, and the lawyer charged too much money,
and I think that's scared J off. So whatever after that, Yeah,
but yeah, yeah, I mean, but I did that record.
Joe McEwan and Warner Brothers was none too happy about
that decision for both of them to work with me again.
Speaker 1 (39:14):
Really now, how come?
Speaker 2 (39:17):
I mean, I think in his mind it's like he
he would have preferred them to work with like Tom
Petty's people, like either Dracuilius or Richard Dodd. He was
really into Richard Dodd at the time, which we did have,
like we incorporated Richard in both, like the mixing of
both those records just sort of like a that was
sort of a compromise that was met, you know, and
(39:38):
it was it was fine. It's like I started to
like lose track of my own aesthetic in that and
just like what I was supposed to do, like working
for more money and more time and for like Warner
Brothers wasn't happy when you just handle them a record
that you'd worked on for two weeks since like and
you hadn't spent all the money. You know, It's like,
are you sure? This is it? Like life happy? Why
(40:01):
are we not supposed to be happy? You know? Then
you start Then I started second guessing like crazy, and
it's like my work really suffered because I wasn't ever
whatever I was doing was never good enough for the
guns at Warner Brothers. So, I mean, I really that
messed me up for quite a while, and I would
look in retrospect. I looked back to records I was
doing three years previous to that, and they were totally fine.
(40:22):
I was probably my best work, because I would it
was just I was just at that point before I
was getting like really super critical feedback with from people
that just could not be pleased unless it was like
there people that were doing the work.
Speaker 1 (40:34):
Yeah. Well, it's a similar story at Albedian. Then Utero really.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Like yeah, now that that stuffs crushing, man, it messes
you up. I remember, like Steve was that messed him up.
It's just like he's like, what am I going to do?
I'm like, dude, you could also go back to journalism
and it's like what do you do anyway? He's like, no,
I'm a record producer. I'm like, okay, but yeah, no,
it's that stuff is like it's ego crushing. It's like
(40:58):
the first things like getting over ego, like blows like that.
It took it took me years. I don't know if
I ever did get over it. It's just it's like
now I know. It's like I got to the point
where it's like mixes took me entirely too long because
that's so neurotic about it.
Speaker 1 (41:14):
Which of those two records did you make first? Was
it AM or was it?
Speaker 2 (41:17):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (41:18):
AM was first? Okay, and you had that kind of
a front row seat to a strange time of you know,
parting of two bands and then having those two projects.
Speaker 2 (41:28):
Yeah. Yeah, it was really unfortunate because I didn't know.
I couldn't choose sides. What was I supposed to do?
I mean, I liked both of them. I was probably
a little bit closer to Jeff. We were actually putting,
you know, buds for a bit.
Speaker 1 (41:43):
It seems like he's a little more outgoing and probably
easier to.
Speaker 2 (41:46):
Yeah, and he was like and he was pushing in
an envelope and in a way that my my punk
rock self appreciated. I was worth like futurism and like
mowing over boundaries. I like that. But yeah, but yeah,
Jay was Yeah, it was just really unfortunate. And then
(42:07):
when I worked with Jay that was like that that
was kind that really bummed Jeff out too.
Speaker 1 (42:11):
So I was gonna say it was alreny hard feelings
about you being.
Speaker 2 (42:15):
Yeah, I mean as good to meet as he could be,
but he was really really not happy about it at all.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
Yeah, I can imagine that's just yeah, it's supposed to do,
I mean, a fortunate spot to be in, but also
a very.
Speaker 2 (42:33):
It was awkward. Yeah, but I was so busy I
couldn't get caught up and the drama of it, it
didn't matter to me.
Speaker 1 (42:40):
Yeah. Well then after that, like I'm you know, looking
at It's funny because I've talked to a few people producers,
and it's fun because there's always the records that you're like,
I want to talk to that person because they were
you know, they did this record, that record, and then
you go down the rabbit hole and you're like, whoa,
there's a bunch of other stuff on here. I didn't
even realize they were a part of it. And I
did the same thing with you so like, you worked
(43:01):
with Magna Pop, which I had Ruthie on here at
one point.
Speaker 2 (43:04):
She's great, She's amazing.
Speaker 1 (43:06):
I love Ruthie, loved Ruthie. She was fun. And then, uh,
you work with Beck on a song for Odalay, which
I didn't know that either. How did that come about?
That's that was an interesting one.
Speaker 2 (43:18):
Yeah, I would imagine that was that came about because
of Joey Werenker. Okay, they were They had a day
off in Minneapolis when they're doing touring Mellow Gold, and
Joey just called me. It's like, hey, do you have
a do you want to can you get us into
a studio for a day. I'm like, yeah, sure, and
uh so we went to Terrarium for a day and
(43:39):
Beck wanted to record a bunch of Blue Standards with
Ray and Glover. Huh so we we set up and
we did that and it was just basically an afternoon
and like we got it done and then backs like
you want to keep going and I'm make sure. He's
like I just want us throw some weird stuff, you know.
It's like so we so we've got we went from
like these really just sort of like live in the
studio Acoustic Blue Standards, and then then things got crazy
(44:03):
and it's like all right, let's blow up the drums.
It's like overload the mixing. Guess great, all right, now
what do we We were just layering just like all
kinds of weird stuff, and it was like it was
a blast, and he just liked that. I wasn't wasn't
afraid to go from one extreme to the other, you know,
And and quickly.
Speaker 1 (44:23):
A strange point of time for him, from you know,
mellow Gold to Odal like well, Gold's odd, it's an
odd record, but like, yeah, it was quite a turn
right there.
Speaker 2 (44:34):
Yeah. I wasn't sure what he was about yet at
that point. And then yeah, so, I mean that was
right about right before I moved to North Carolina. And
then when I moved to North Carolina, they they wanted
me to go to Los Angeles to spend a week
recording uh, live band stuff. I was like, all right,
(44:55):
sure out there, Yeah they were, they were. They were
doing the majority of the work with the with the
Dust Brothers, but he wanted to do some other stuff. Mean, well,
well he had a bunch of other Yeah, there was
like three sessions going he was doing stuff with Rob Schnapp. Uh,
there was I think there's one other production team. There's
like four studios who were like working on Mellow Gold
(45:18):
or not Melo Gold, but odal A. But when I
got to Los Angeles, it's like the time and been
booked at the Beastie Boys studio ge Son And when
I got there, I'm like, hey, I'm Brian, you were
to work with beck And it was Mario Caldatto sitting
in the mixing guest was like what, I'm like, I'm
Brian Paulson. I'm here to work with Beckham. They were
supposed to be recording a live band. He's like they
told me I was doing that. I'm like, oh, and
(45:41):
it was apparently Joey was apparently not too pleased. But
it's like the beck thought would be funny to put it,
put us together, just just to see what would happened. Yeah,
without telling us.
Speaker 1 (45:50):
He's like throwing a banjo on a funk song.
Speaker 2 (45:53):
Yeah, No, it was funny. And then of course there
wasn't a live band. It was just sort of like,
you know, he and Joey just sort of layering stuff.
But we got into a groove with it, and but
it was all this like it was it was all
like that crazy stuff like we didn't like post like
Rand Glover sessions. It was like layers. We just do
a song a day and just like fill up the
(46:14):
twenty four track and just sort of like weed through
stuff and then just mix it quickly at the end
of the day and that was it.
Speaker 1 (46:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:22):
I remember after a week of that, I'm like, oh
my god, what is happening. I was enjoying it. But
then it's like Mark Katz from Jeff and it's like, hey,
I'm a sting swing by and check the stuff out.
I was like, oh no, it's supposed to be like
the follow up to Mellow Gold, and like like I
was like Mark.
Speaker 1 (46:37):
We're loser part too. It's like I pulled him aside immediately.
Speaker 2 (46:41):
He's like just so you know, stuff's kind of out there,
and he's like, no, that's all right, man. It's like
we're not looking for hits. I mean, he's he's Dylan Dust.
We're in this for the long haul. I'm like, well, good,
because here you go. You know. It's like, but yeah,
the only track that ended up on the record was
(47:04):
was it minus I Forget? But yeah, but I mean,
there was a couple of cracks on there. There wasn't
one called thunder Peel that was amazing that didn't make
the record. It finally came out on some some other
compilation later.
Speaker 1 (47:15):
But yeah, yeah, I was gonna ask did any of
that other stuff end up on any B sides.
Speaker 2 (47:20):
Or Yeah, all of it eventually came out. I think
there was probably like seven eight songs that we did.
Speaker 1 (47:26):
Oh that's cool, very cool. But but it's like, yeah,
is he to work with at that time or what's that?
Speaker 2 (47:32):
Like?
Speaker 1 (47:32):
He was back pretty easy to work with that time?
Speaker 2 (47:34):
Yeah, No, I mean it was really his process. That's
where I learned to not be so precious about stuff.
You know. It's like I love the way he would work.
It's just like lay it all down, it doesn't work out,
who cares move on? I might like it in a month,
I might not. I mean, it's just we're not thinking
about that. We're just just keep it rolling. And and
just the way he would just sort of like it's
(47:59):
where it's like when he be doing vocal takes or
just some things where he would just sort of like disappear.
You know, it's like all of a sudden, you could
like you could assume sort of like leaving his body
and going to this weird creative space and and then
he'd be done to the take and then you'd ask
me a question. You could assume he'd just like kind
of come back into his Body's like, oh yeah, what
you know. It's like like wow, this guys the trip,
you know, but amazing, you know. But it's really it
(48:21):
was really key to see me like how he worked
and he just would just not be precious about it.
And and it's like if you didn't get it today,
it's like you would just not labor what you had
done today, you would try it a different way two
weeks later.
Speaker 1 (48:37):
Yeah, oh wow. And then the other one that I noticed,
it's it's funny this other thing, as I mentioned, I
had Ruthie On and I had Steve On, I had
Matt On from Archers Alf. I saw that you did
a loaf from Yeah you're in the neighborhood, I suppose.
Speaker 2 (48:57):
Yeah, yeah, no, I came down here and still Bob
Weston's business.
Speaker 1 (49:02):
I'll show them.
Speaker 2 (49:03):
I gave it Mark Well, he is fair.
Speaker 1 (49:06):
Which which records did you do? Is that all the
nation's airports is one of them.
Speaker 2 (49:09):
Yeah, all the nation's airports and white trash heroes.
Speaker 1 (49:12):
Nice and what was that like working with them? They're
such an interesting band too, and it probably kind of
fulfilled a little bit of your your artynis that you like.
Speaker 2 (49:20):
Oh god, yeah, Eric Bachman, Yeah, definitely the first one. Yeah,
airports is great. I mean that there was still very
much a functional band at that point, but it's like
they were sort of like starting starting to fray at
the edges, because I mean they've been on the road
for I don't know how many years by the time
we got around doing all the nations airports, and I
remember Eric giving me the demos to all the nation's
airports and I was like, uh, oh, this is great,
(49:44):
this is really great. This is different, this could be
this could we might have to be making some decisions
that won't be like entirely democratic or well received to
accomplish this dream.
Speaker 1 (49:58):
How So, just in style of the songs, just what.
Speaker 2 (50:01):
I mean, it was like, yeah, it was more much
more expansive, and it was clearly that it wasn't just like,
you know, in the style of Archers of Loaf, you know, yeah,
at all? Yeah, no, exactly, And we cut the beds
in Memphis, and then Eric and Matt and I went
to Richmond, Virginia to uh Sound of Music Studios and
(50:25):
just started like layering it up and just like making
it doing all kinds of crazy arty stuff, uh, including
having Joan Osborne sing backup vocals, which caused a bit
of a rub one of the many.
Speaker 1 (50:41):
I didn't know that.
Speaker 2 (50:43):
Yeah, no, I mean she's just part of a gang
vocal It's not really, but yeah, it's like we were
there for like two or three weeks, I think, just
like just like going to town on on that, on
those songs, and by the time that Eric and Mark
(51:05):
came back into the fold and heard it, they're like,
this is not Archer's Love. They were not They were
not receptive to the.
Speaker 1 (51:11):
Direction at all, which guys Mark.
Speaker 2 (51:14):
And Eric Johnson the other guitar player. Yeah, so I
can't remember how it was resolved, but.
Speaker 1 (51:23):
Yeah, that one took me a minute because exactly what
you just said. You know, I was such a big
fan of the EP, which is maybe my favorite. It's
such a good thing and VV and then that came out.
I was like, Wow, this is a left ter, Like
this is different than what they've done. Before, but now
I love it.
Speaker 2 (51:42):
It probably should have just been the first Crooked Fingers record,
but I'm not that record. I mean, I think in retrospect,
Matt was on board. That's when Matt really got serious
about his craft, which was really it was really nice
to see him step up like that.
Speaker 1 (51:55):
Yeah, he's a really nice guy. I was really important.
Speaker 2 (51:57):
He is a sweetheart. Yeah, I love I don't see
him often enough.
Speaker 1 (52:02):
Yeah, is that it?
Speaker 2 (52:06):
Yeah? I don't get it. Well, okay, four, I don't
get to Ashville very often.
Speaker 1 (52:10):
It's funny. I had the guy that I saint, Paul,
guy that I been friends with forever. He's the only
trim me on Archers alone from the nineties, and so
when I met with Matt, I you know who use
my co host, and it was just gear talk between
those two. I was just loving it. I'm just sitting
and I'm like, they're just this pedal and that pedal.
And then like, my friend Bill bought this pedal. And
(52:31):
then Matt's like, yeah, I get these bass straps or
I'm a bigger guy, so and Bill's a bigger guy,
so he bought the strap and like, yeah, they were
just pals. It was pretty fun to watch.
Speaker 2 (52:42):
So, yeah, it's funny. I had no idea of the
reach that those guys had. I was just figured they
were just, you know, another like small piece of the
thing that was happening in Chapel Hill. But it's like
a lot more reach than a lot of that stuff.
Speaker 3 (52:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (52:57):
I wish they'd come back around here in Minneapolis again.
They were scheduled for twenty twenty, then it was canceled.
I think you're going to do the Fine Line, which
I thought was kind of an interesting venue for them. Yeah,
as you know, but then they never They never rebooked
since then, so hopefully they'll come back around. I saw
it at the four hundred Bar though. That was a
(53:17):
lot of fun.
Speaker 2 (53:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (53:20):
What do you think of that new record of Theirs?
That's another one.
Speaker 2 (53:23):
Listen to the whole thing yet, I really, I really
dug the energy of the single. I mean it's still
I mean, they're still fully intact. It's it's wild.
Speaker 1 (53:31):
You know, it doesn't sound like Archers of Loaf, no,
like a song that does. And I was like, I
really like this record, but it sounds like a different
band again.
Speaker 2 (53:44):
Interesting. Yeah, So I think the one I've heard actually
is Raley Days.
Speaker 1 (53:48):
Yeah, yeah, and that was good.
Speaker 2 (53:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (53:52):
You got to put your your preconceived notions off to
the side before you pop it on. What an Archers
of Wolf record sounds like and then you hear it like,
this is chock full of good songs. Again, it's just
not right in the style that you think it's gonna be.
Speaker 2 (54:05):
Right. Yeah, it does. It does seem a little more conventional.
I guess in hindsight, it was funny I saw them
was the last. It wasn't like they would just play
at the Cat's Cradle here like within the last year. Yeah.
It's like I've been like deep in this like sort
of like techno and house groove for the past like
four or five years, digging into electronic music. And then
(54:26):
go and hear that again. I was like, oh my god, Okay,
rhythm right, no, no, no, no, rhythm uh it is
a rhythm of a sort. But it was like I
was sort of like, wow, this is sort of like
just like four guys playing four different songs and that
start and end at the same time. It's like somehow
it works, you know. It's just like some of those
songs that like I recorded and we realized why I
was having such a hard time mixing them because it's
(54:46):
like there's no real interplay. It's just like there's people
going out in these crazy directions around like with with
Eric in the middle.
Speaker 1 (54:57):
Well, the guitar playing on those songs, it's just bizarre.
Speaker 2 (55:02):
Yeah, yeah, EJ. I really like EJ. Like Eric Johnson's take.
It's just like it really throws you for a loop
in the best possible way.
Speaker 1 (55:12):
Yeah, there's nothing standard about it, that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (55:15):
No, no, no, it's it's funny because it's like it's
like they share a little bit of DNA with paulvo
you know. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (55:23):
Yeah, so you said that you're kind of not doing
much recording. I see you get your studio there, but
you're not doing much this.
Speaker 2 (55:31):
This is finally, this finally just got to this state
that it's in, uh before the families came to visit
for Christmas. It's like we bought this house uh six,
at least seven years ago this coming spring, and it's
like this stuff was all in boxes. Yeah, but now
it's like trying to figure out what it's going to
be and it's new incardination. Most of this will probably disappear.
Speaker 1 (55:57):
Just to make sure, it all turns on and then
you know throw.
Speaker 2 (55:59):
Yeah even if that yeah, as buyer beware as is.
But yeah, it's really interesting. It's like I've been It's
like one of my neighbors here is Brad Cook. I
don't know if you're familiar with him. He's part of
like the whole bone of Ara Camp.
Speaker 1 (56:14):
Oh okay.
Speaker 2 (56:15):
I think he's a producer that's doing real low. He
lives just like two blocks from me, and mat like
going over and helping him get set up with a
few things and just watching the way he works. I'm like, wow, damn,
things have really changed, you know. Yeah, I don't know
if I'm cut out for that. I don't want to
do the dirty work anymore. Mix maybe, but yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (56:35):
So when's the last time you recorded a band.
Speaker 2 (56:37):
It's been you said, wow, twenty I did a Mountain
Mur record. I mixed a Mountain Ur record, and then
another band and did a record with the band called
Paranoid Style, And I think it was twenty seventeen. That
was the last time. It wasn't an intentional cutoff date
or that wasn't like this is it, I'm not not
doing this. It was just off first slowed down considerably.
(57:01):
But then when offers had come in and be like, well,
we wanted to come to Seattle, I'm like, well, you know,
I've got this archiving gig at UNC now that takes
up a lot of my time. Yeah, so yeah, and
then yeah, it was just it was good to step
away because it's like, I I didn't really think feel
like I was bringing anything. At a point I was
like getting really I was just exhausted, and I've got
(57:22):
a really nasty perfectionist streak that I will it's impossible
to live up to my own standards. So I mean
it's like and for me to get happy with the record,
it's like and not after I could afford to like
just bring stuff home and mix it. It was a
painstaking process. And it's like and raising the bar on myself.
(57:44):
Every time I made a record, it was just it
was unsustainable. It wasn't it wasn't worth the sleepless nights.
It wasn't. I was driving myself absolutely crazy. It's like
I couldn't trying to top your every time you stepped
up to the plate. It's just not hell not healthy.
Speaker 1 (58:02):
Yeah, I kind of feel that writing songs. Yeah, you
just beat the hell out of yourself. You're The way
it works is you're a genius the moment you write it,
and then the next day you're trash. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (58:14):
I mean, that's that's what Beck's approach of, just like
not being precious about it. You just knock it out,
put it away. And that's Brad Brad Cook just did
that with a band that I worked with, one of
the last bands I worked with, also from Athens' Dategical
Future Birds. Oh yeah, and they were they were there's
a lot of I think there's like seven or eight
(58:35):
guys in that band, and I just mixed for them.
But it's like it sounds like it was like, you know,
it was a lot quite an undertaking just getting the
stuff to the point to be able to be mixed.
And even when I was mixing, it's like, oh, we
need another two overdubs and be like, oh god, it's
like we've got two days left to mix fourteen sons.
You know. It's one of those kinds of things. Yeah,
(58:55):
but he did something really smart with them. He he
realized that they I mean, they were on like they've
been on the frat circuit in the South forever and
they played together fantastically, so he just like he took
them to Sonic Branch in Texas. They cut it live,
very minimal overdubs, and he sent them home. He's like,
(59:16):
you're not going to hear any of this for two months.
They're like what, Like no, it's like trust me, And
sure enough they got back that there was just a
few things that they wanted to do to it, and
that was it. I mean when he played it for me,
I was like, don't even mix this, this is it.
It sounded so good. I was like, why don't don't
tempt fate? Leave it be? Yeah, what record is this?
(59:39):
It's a it's a record. It's not it should be
coming out and probably with a couple months. I would
imagine a band called Future Birds. Then something happened with
them inexplicably that nobody understands. It's like they're playing the
frat circu in the South forever. It's like, all of
a sudden, they're selling out Red Rocks since they heard.
Nobody knows where the populatory came from there, just like
(01:00:00):
all of a sudden they're popular. It's just it's strange.
Speaker 1 (01:00:04):
Yeah, there's no rhyme or reason of this ship is there.
Speaker 2 (01:00:07):
Oh god, No, that's the other thing I don't understand anymore.
I don't know. I don't have the stock for it. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:00:16):
You hear some of these bands, You're like, this is
one of the best bands I've ever heard, and they're
playing some shitty bar in Fargo, North Dakota. Yeah, you
see what's selling, and you're like, why, why does anyone
care about this?
Speaker 2 (01:00:27):
But I haven't figured out what it'll take, like yank
me out of retirement yet they're sabbatical. It's not retirement.
It's like you have Gary Louris has asked me to
help them with stuff and Super drunk a couple of times,
and I'm just like, I'm kind of busy, studio is
not set up yet. You know.
Speaker 1 (01:00:46):
It's like, well, it's those were good people to have
to turn down, you.
Speaker 2 (01:00:53):
Know, Yeah, and I didn't. That's the other thing that's
like that's been beneficial, just they're kind of pulling back
from it. It's like actually learning to say no. And
then unfortunately I got really I got a little too
good at this. But I mean I know it's like
I probably will end up like at some point I
would love to mix something for Brad it's like I
was tempted by this future birds thing. It's like, well,
(01:01:13):
we're looking for a mixer. I'm like, not ready yet.
I got it. I gotta get my ears back in order.
And that's the other thing. My aging ears just can't
take a lot of That's another reason I have retreated electronic
things like I can listen to that for a lot
longer than really like bashed out ride cymbals and square
wave distorted guitars. I mean that destroys my like, it
throws me off after an hour listening to that stuff.
Speaker 1 (01:01:36):
Now what so speaking to that, So, what kinds of
stuff are you listening to? What musically bands or groups
that you're into.
Speaker 2 (01:01:43):
No, it's mostly just electronic producers from like Stockholm and
Berlin and Bristol and some of the Bushwick stuff like yeah,
just like young fledgling DJ producer people. It's like, yeah,
techno ish, yeah, uh, it's just so mean. I always
(01:02:04):
had a bent for synthesizers since you know, devo and
craft work in the seventies and a lot of it
that a lot of them. Me getting into that was
driven by we uh Mogfest being hosted here in Durham
for a number of years, so I was exposed to
all kinds of stuff through that. And my partner Sarah
is a DJ, and uh she's mostly DJ's eighty stuff
(01:02:26):
and whatnot. But it's like, all of a sudden, it's
like I kind of saw the synergy between this electronic
stuff and like I was like, oh wait, it's like
there's a direct line from what I'm doing over here
to her CDJs right here on this on this desk.
And I started made that connection. I'm like, well, hang on,
this is I'm kind of into this, you know. It's
like it's like just stepping up to like the c
DJs and like you can manipulate record like it's just
(01:02:49):
and when when we first got to hold one of those,
I was like, oh my god. If I was seventeen,
I would be making a record on these freaking things.
You know, like they've got a mic input on it.
You can It's like who needs samplers, It's all right
here to steal it.
Speaker 1 (01:03:02):
Do you do you have a keyboard? Do you?
Speaker 2 (01:03:04):
That's still the other thing. It's like I I quit
interfacing like my synthesizer stuff with keyboards because it's like
it's like I'm here's here's the cord I play this one. Yeah, yeah,
I know that one your black keys, so you can
do it on the white keys with these three fingers,
and so it's like all the same. So I really
got into just sort of sequencers and Euclidean sequencers and
(01:03:29):
program I mean, I never never thought I'd be into programming.
Used to drive me nuts when I was a guitar players.
It was just wasn't immediate enough. But I think through
years of being a mix engineer that really changed. How
I mean, it's like, wait, when I'm a mixing. When
I'm mixing, I'm just moving around chunks of sound and
making them fit together, carving out space, nudging things here
(01:03:50):
and there, you know. And it's like then all of
a sudden that that that I realized. It's like, wait,
this isn't there's not much difference between what I was
doing there with with like human elements whatever, Like now
I'm just like coaxing AI and machines instead.
Speaker 1 (01:04:04):
Yeah, here's moving music, different instruments.
Speaker 2 (01:04:07):
So yeah, and it's like when it's got so much more,
you have so much more control over just like the
the depth and decay of things than you do, like
with I'm not really, but it's just different. And the
weird thing is, it's like you have to animate it.
It's like you're you're trying to like hone in your
musicians with this stuff. Is like make it like you're
(01:04:29):
trying to coax it to life. You're trying to add
humanity to it instead of subtract humanity from it.
Speaker 1 (01:04:34):
Yeah, a little less humanity.
Speaker 2 (01:04:36):
J Yeah, yeah, well calm down, but not too much.
Speaker 1 (01:04:43):
You know.
Speaker 2 (01:04:43):
It's it's it's really it's taken me years to kind
fully appreciate what a different headspace it is. Like I said,
it's like now, it's just it's sort of a calming tool.
It's it's like it's it's yoga. It's like doing yoga
or going out golfing or something. You know, it's or cooking,
cooking and like just doodling, sound goodling And really, if
(01:05:04):
I have any anxiety whatsoever, which I'm.
Speaker 1 (01:05:07):
Prone to eno fan, I suppose a fan of.
Speaker 2 (01:05:10):
His early work, not a fan of the person so much.
I don't ever want to hear him speak. It's just
like it makes it's I'm like, sh no, you're not.
It's like wow, looking at he's like sitting out in
front of the logic. It's like, isn't this just amazing?
I mean, look what I can do. I'm like, yeah,
any Brian, everybody does that now, you know. It's like, sorry, dude,
(01:05:32):
you know, it's like, but yeah, I really appreciate his
he was pioneering in his work, the early stuff. But yeah,
and he still does cool stuff occasionally. You know. It's
like Fred again an emo record, What's wrong with me?
What's happening? It's likely O, guess what. I don't care
about being cool anymore. I can listen to whatever I want.
It's great.
Speaker 1 (01:05:50):
My friend Bred bran if I was talking about earlier
with the Bebo Bebop Docks. He's a big EEno head,
Like I think you two would be pals. He got
very similar taste to me is but he was away was.
He's quite a bit older than me, and he's always
been telling me you know, you know, you know, and
never did anything like in the last five or six years. Now,
I'm like, oh, I like to see no thing. I'm like,
it's it's funny. How was life changes and you get older,
(01:06:14):
sometimes things finally hit you. And I was kind of
been there, so.
Speaker 2 (01:06:18):
Yeah, No. It's funny. It's like I had all those
like all those seventies records all along, but it's like
nothing that I really I didn't. I didn't really dig
into him, you know. But when it's like you can't
avoid him, it's like people people will stare you down
that path, you know. It's it's almost like this, like Dylan,
I'm like, yeah, no shit, Dylan, Yeah, wow, yeah, yeah,
(01:06:41):
what It's like, what did I miss? Yeah, He's still
the greatest songwriter ever apparently, and it's like, yeah, listen
to it. I don't need to listen to it Dylan.
Speaker 1 (01:06:50):
But Dylan is another one of those that, yeah, for years,
I'm like, eh, I don't get it, and then one
day I did get it, but it took forever.
Speaker 2 (01:06:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:07:00):
The same thing to me, honestly, Like you know, London
Calling was I was every top album list of all time,
and I'm like, of course, the greatest album cover of
all time in my opinion, it's amazing.
Speaker 2 (01:07:10):
But the most embarrassing and sad thing for me with
the Clash was it's like I love the Clash, Yeah,
And I realized at some point I was like, you
know what, over the last thirty years, I've listened to
a lot more Fleetwood Mac Tusk than I've listened to
London Calling. And I'm afraid to admit not afraid to
admit it anymore.
Speaker 1 (01:07:26):
Well, Fleetwood Mac was another one. Growing up, I wasn't
into Fleetwood Mac. Now I love it.
Speaker 2 (01:07:31):
Uh, Lindsey Buckingham fan, I'm a huge fan.
Speaker 1 (01:07:34):
Oh my god, this is funny. I was walking down
the street in New York City and what year this
must have been, probably twenty eighteen or twenty nineteen, probably eighteen,
I think, And I see all these people on the
street and they're screaming and big ruckus, and I'm like,
what are they protesting? Is you know it's twenty eighteen.
(01:07:55):
We got to be protesting something. And then all of
a sudden, I'm like, oh, they're Lindsay Buckingham walking into
that building. I thought they were having some political No,
they were just excited to see Lindsay bucking and walking
into a building.
Speaker 2 (01:08:11):
I was so bummed. He was supposed to play here
a couple of years ago, but he got sick. Oh yeah,
Like I think it's the second time he's canceled a
tour here. It's like the lead up but yeah, and
that was right before Christine to Bee died, so I
was like some tide to that, but he apparently didn't know.
Speaker 1 (01:08:27):
So yeah, she was. She was there with him in
New York, I guess because they were going in to
do an interview in some building when they did that
kind of duo duo album.
Speaker 2 (01:08:35):
But yeah, that even some of those recent solo albums
are good. I was like, Elliott Smith, whatever, listen to this?
Speaker 1 (01:08:46):
That guy. I don't know how when people say the
best guitar players, he isn't up there at the top usually. Yeah,
you know, the big Page Hendricks and it's a different style,
but it's it's insane, like speaking being.
Speaker 2 (01:09:00):
Beat over the head with something like Dylan. I mean,
I think it's probably just like the people have been
so beating over the head with Fleetwood Mac. You know,
it's like that they're lumped in with the Eagles. It's
just they're like, you know, don't ever want to hear
that again or even consider it.
Speaker 1 (01:09:11):
And I get that, Yeah, you ever make it up
to Minneapolis these days or you pretty much?
Speaker 2 (01:09:17):
I was just up there last last week. I snuck
up for the Arc Welder shows.
Speaker 1 (01:09:21):
Oh you were up here?
Speaker 2 (01:09:22):
For that.
Speaker 1 (01:09:23):
That's cool. How are they?
Speaker 2 (01:09:24):
No, I didn't tell anybody was coming except Tony Pooky
was the only one that knew. I just showed up.
It was it was great, it was Bill was Gravery
was shocked, which was which was my intention.
Speaker 1 (01:09:37):
Where were where were those out? Is that the turf?
Speaker 2 (01:09:40):
Was that the Turf Club? But it's like, yeah, it's
one of those things that's I just felt the need.
It's like I need to do this. I mean, who
knows how much longer there is to do something like this,
and I really need to let people that mean something
to me know that I actually care, you know, still
like even though it's like the serial tribal tribalist is
has gone are down the road, there's still people I
(01:10:01):
care about. But no Graver is like that. I could
have talked to him for days because we've got a
lot of catching up to do.
Speaker 1 (01:10:11):
It's awesome. Did you get a copy of jefs Person's book.
Speaker 2 (01:10:14):
I haven't yet. A lot of people are talking about it. It
sounds like it's good.
Speaker 1 (01:10:18):
It's super good. I think I read that thinging about
a day. It was just a lot of fun.
Speaker 3 (01:10:22):
Ye.
Speaker 1 (01:10:23):
His love of music just comes out and is writing.
Speaker 2 (01:10:26):
My God, it's yeah. I was running into him in
Athens George occasionally, and it's just like just kind of
stunned by it. It's just like he's still like it's
like a kid in the candy store with it's still
at his age. I'm just like, wow, I lost that
so long ago. Actually I got it back now with
like the like diving down all these like DJ and
(01:10:49):
electronic music scenes all across the world. It's like it's
it's it's the thrill is still there. It's just it's yeah,
you just it just takes work, that's all. You don't
need somebody to tell you what to do, like to
find it's like or somebody could. It's nice to have
somebody to kind of steer you in a direction. But
it's like that's the thing I appreciate about. It's like
I'm finding things I like because I just like it,
(01:11:12):
not because somebody that's like it's a part of a
it's not Condon Nast slash Pitchfork telling me this is
what I should be listening to. It's like it's it's
nice to be able to find your own path now,
and it's it's actually really doable if you take the
time to do it.
Speaker 1 (01:11:25):
And you don't have to wait for those records to
show up from the end.
Speaker 2 (01:11:27):
No, no, no, I don't need And that's I'm not
one of those people that is like sad about like
physical media disappearing. It's like, I love being able to
like travel around with this thing and hook it up
to my car and just like it's all there. You know.
I love that.
Speaker 1 (01:11:43):
I love having both options as you Yeah, yeah, no,
I mean there's something you love how quickly you can
just pull something up on your phone.
Speaker 2 (01:11:51):
Yeah, it's Sarah uh DJ's vinyl. And she's just like
I just got her into like the c DJ thing,
just like a and a half ago, and she's got
a bad back so.
Speaker 1 (01:12:05):
To carry around Oh god.
Speaker 2 (01:12:07):
Yeah, no, I was the one that had to do that.
But then she realizes, like when she's like walked out
the door with a USB stick and that's all she
had to bring in some headphones, she was like, Ooh,
I could get used to this. And now she's getting
into the flexibility of it, and she's getting really good
at just like the instant like mixed like total crazy mixes.
And now it's like it's hard for her to go back.
(01:12:28):
It's like it's like to pull out all the vinyl
and I have to carry it and it's so slow
because then you have to like put the record on
and it's like it's just too slow. The book element
of it, that's the part I miss. And that's also
when my career went down the tubes, is when nobody
like when CDs, people could buy CDs and my free
(01:12:49):
advertising gone.
Speaker 1 (01:12:52):
So looking back to wrap up here and let you
get back to your to your Saturday night. I've got
a tweeen ager sleepover happening over at my house right now.
Speaker 2 (01:13:02):
So exciting out there.
Speaker 1 (01:13:04):
Well, I wish me luck. I'm gonna go hide and
watch the Timberwolves. But you know, looking at your career
as a whole, you know, is there an album that
you're you're most proud of that you were a part off.
Speaker 2 (01:13:17):
There's a number of them. The Willgune Sunwold come to mind.
I mean that that was like kind of the pinnacle.
That was like, uh, that was the peak of the fun.
Speaker 1 (01:13:27):
Those are so cord.
Speaker 2 (01:13:30):
But it leading up to that, it's like, Uh, the
Arcwady Records are crucial in my development. Whole I thought
was executed very well, even though it's like we demoed
the ship out of it, and that's one of those
worst situations where we demoed this into it and it
actually benefited us. Uh slind Spiderland. Of course that I
(01:13:50):
owe everything to that record. I mean that that's when
things just went bananas for me. It was just like
one of those moments Unrest, Perfect Teeth, super Chunk, foolish
m I adore those people as a band and as friends.
It' they mean so much to me. God, I'm gonna
(01:14:14):
get scared. I don't know, I'm pretty It's like the
polo records were great, particularly like the the in Prism record,
Like Ash and I really be that one. We we
went a little tracy at the hid Sight. It was
worth it, even though it bumps some people out because
it wasn't like like you said, with the Archers Loaf,
It's like this is a Nurtre's record. It's like that
(01:14:35):
wasn't really a polo record either, but yeah, it was
an Ash Bowie extravaganza.
Speaker 1 (01:14:40):
Well yeah, that's how you keep going, really like if
you keep it's I love the Ramones, but how many
Ramones records you need? You know?
Speaker 2 (01:14:49):
Right? Yeah? How did they do that? You know, it's
like we'll get Phil Spector it'll be really different still,
So yeah, I mean it's I was. I was so
fortunate to be handed so many amazing things, like yeah,
even working with Dinosaur Junior. I mean it's yeah, there's
(01:15:09):
endless I know, I'm forgetting a million things because there's
just so many things to keep up with. But I
think I touched the ones that are like really sent
me on a path, and that's that was really important
to me.
Speaker 1 (01:15:20):
Well, Dinosaur Junior was probably the end of your ears.
Speaker 2 (01:15:24):
Yeah right, oh my god. Yeah, back, I didn't write
your plugs back then either, amazingly enough.
Speaker 1 (01:15:30):
Well, I appreciate you coming on and chat and it's funny.
Speaker 2 (01:15:33):
Yeah we could forever, but plenty of editing ahead of you.
Speaker 1 (01:15:37):
No, it's good stuff, and thanks for your work on
those records. Like a lot of the stuff that you
mentioned are literally right behind me. So I appreciate you
talking with me about.
Speaker 2 (01:15:46):
That and Babs of tailand too.
Speaker 1 (01:15:49):
Oh my bad Lorian too. Like I said, I.
Speaker 2 (01:15:53):
Guess I'm going to forget and I want to have
extreme guilt once we get off this call.
Speaker 1 (01:15:58):
But this is just just got to end it with
I've enjoyed every moment working on the wedding present I
worked with was the best.
Speaker 2 (01:16:10):
It was the best. There was a friend of mine
to New York that got so sick of me in
nineteen ninety three because like, after your unrest, it would
be like, I've just done the best record I've ever done,
and then months later, oh, this Joe Henry records the
best record ever done. This Uncle Tublaw record is the
best record I've ever do, And she's like, every record
you've done is the best record you've ever done. Shut up. Well,
I mean at the time it was that year was
(01:16:32):
so crazy. It's like I couldn't believe the phone calls
I was getting. I was just like, what the hell
is happening? This is a dream. It was good. That
was fun. It was fun for a while. I'm a
very fortunate person.
Speaker 1 (01:16:51):
Ryan Paulson look at that. What a great guy, really
amazing career in producing and engineering literally some of the
some of my favorite records he was involved, so really
fun to chat with him. Thank him for being on
the show, Thank you for listening. We've got some upcoming
(01:17:12):
shows from the High End Stress Frontier. I guess I've
got a duo show with its bass player Jim, doing
an acoustics show next month. March looks like March ninth
at Black Lung in the Chicago area, and we'll be
seeing my pals Billy Pilgrim the next night playing in Ottawa, Illinois.
(01:17:36):
To make sure you pick up your tickets to that
see Christian and Andrew do their thing, and that's gonna
be an amazing show as it always is. And listen
back to that episode I had with them from a
couple of years ago. It's great to have them back
and playing again. So if you're in the Illinois area,
make sure you go see Billy Pilgrim. And also there'll
be some upcoming high end stress full band shows starting
(01:17:58):
in April. We're about to hit the studio one again,
work on the follow up to Hold Me In and
as soon as we can get back in the studio.
So thanks again for listening. We will see you for
the next episode of the figure Ates podcast and have
a lovely day.
Speaker 4 (01:18:26):
Workin saxes, loads and loads of faxes, rock and roll, Dreamer, dreams, Loyalty, Fame,
send sympathetically, traffic lights, deep Tide, Did you call Sue
expected the dark comedy of love and life A year
(01:18:52):
in Review.
Speaker 2 (01:18:58):
Who's on the men.
Speaker 5 (01:19:03):
For a broken part? Don't stop for the meaning the life.
Don't stop for meaning.
Speaker 4 (01:19:15):
The lie.
Speaker 1 (01:19:21):
Knock can't.
Speaker 2 (01:19:24):
The things that I have ansome me.
Speaker 3 (01:19:29):
Don't stop for the meaning.
Speaker 2 (01:19:31):
The lie.
Speaker 1 (01:19:36):
Knock can't the things that I have the minsome me.
Speaker 3 (01:19:45):
Don't stop for the meaning a lie. Don't stop for
the meaning the lie. Don't stop for the meeting. Don't
stop for the meeting the lie.
Speaker 2 (01:20:03):
S S S S S storing sub spell says
You are listening to the Figure Eights podcast. I'm your host,
Nick Leak from the band High on Stress so of Minneapolis, Minnesota,
and I appreciate you listening to the show. You may
have realized the last episode that we had here a
few weeks back with Dan Murphy from Soul Asylum, and
it had been about two years since the episodes before that,
(00:48):
so it was really great. It's a really great response
to that episode with Dan, and really enjoyed that conversation
and appreciate all the night sports about it. It's good
to be back once again. It won't be weekly, will
be coming as it comes. You know, we've got to
write songs, play music, do all the things that you
do in this world, but we will have them from
(01:08):
time to time and I appreciate you tuning in to listen.
So this episode we've got Brian Halson. He's a music
producer behind such amazing records Wilco Am Sunbold, Trace, Uncle
Tublow and Dine Archers of Low Magna Pop. He did
(01:28):
production work on Beck's Total A record and as well
as one Dear to Me Here Slim Dunlaps for solo
record The Old New News. So thank you for listening,
and without further ado, I give you Brian Haulson.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
I didn't realize sound crappy. These MacBook cameras were. Well.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
The good news is I only use the audio anyway,
Thank goodness. The ease of conversation. So you're here in
stocks are safe?
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Yeah? They I made sure they're blue. By the way.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
Okay, it's good to know, good to know. Where are
you at? Are you in North Carolina? Is that where
I saw that you lived there?
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah? I live in Durham. I've lived here for seven years,
eight years now, eight years. Moved to North Carolina from
Minneapolis in ninety five. Okay, mostly lived in Chapel Hill, Incarborough. Nice.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
Which part of Minnesota did you grow up? Was it?
But Midgee? Did I see that somewhere?
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Yeah? I did.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
Nice. You don't sound too excited about Bumigie.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
I was well. Once my mother moved to the Minneapolis,
I was eager to follow. I was still in I
think seventh or eighth grade when that happened, and I'd
visit during the summers and I was I was kind
of ready, but they wanted to send me to South
High and I wasn't into South High.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
Only visited, Butmidgee nice place to visit.
Speaker 2 (02:54):
But I grew up.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
I grew up in a small area in North Dakota,
so I definitely you can really Yeah, it's a nice
little town to grow open, but you got to get
out of there at some point, right.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Yeah, it did feel like that I didn't quite fit
in there.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
What kind of a kid were you?
Speaker 2 (03:14):
I was an only kid. I kept myself mostly, but
I was friends with everybody. I was friends with the hoodlums,
I was friends with the jocks. I was friends with,
you know, just about everybody a friend of mine at work.
And I kind of term where we will consider ourselves
serial tribalists.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
I can very much relate to that.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
Yeah, I seemed to be continuing that trend. I've taken
it since COVID. I've definitely taken inventory of people that
aren't near and dear to me, and I make sure
stay in touch with them. But I'm pretty bad about it.
I mean, it was just a nature, especially like moving
into a record making for thirty years, It's like it's
(03:57):
just sort of the nature of the beast. You know,
friends or whoever you're in the room.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
With, right, and there's a lot of time in the
room and a lot of yeah, personalities that you have
to somehow navigate. So I suppose you kind of learned
to get along with.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
You get to know people really fast. It's intense and
there's nothing quite like that intensity. You know.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Yeah, were you a guitar player growing up or what
was what was your yaw?
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Well? Yeah, I started playing violin in the fifth grade,
I think, and then I played I did that until
I was in ninth grade, when I played like all
State orchestra in the summertime, which was great, but that
wasn't enough to keep me entertained. And then I think,
and then my uncle gave me my first He gave
(04:43):
me a kind of a beater I've been as a
classical guitar that he had that he wasn't using. And
that was the kind of the violin is like kind
of cobbling together three fingers and playing black Sabbaths.
Speaker 1 (04:56):
What was your entry to guitar? Usually there's you know,
you get your deep purple and there a lot.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
Of people yeah, oh yeah, and you get smoke in
the water is essential one o one one symptom of
the universe. Flack savage, that kind of stuff you're like, hey,
I can do this, this is fun. But yeah, I
mean it's like and also it's like by the time
I was in ninth grade, it's just like, well, one,
it's like the going from playing state wide Orchestra, from
(05:20):
playing like Sibelius and Mozart and going back to like
Bimidge High School and then playing like bread covers and
of cabbages and kings. I just couldn't. It just wasn't
fulfilling in any way.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
Did you run into other kids that were playing guitar
or you just.
Speaker 2 (05:38):
Oh yeah, yeah, No. I got into all kinds of
crazy trouble in the latter part of well, from ninth
grade on, you know, substances were discovered. No, yeah, yeah,
we I mean we just I mean, nothing really much
happened in that realm. I mean I was like I
was a stereo head, you know. It's like I was
really into like, uh, buying weird records. I got into
(06:01):
that by about ninth grade. It's like I remember, like
I think part of my ninth grade I think it
was eighth or ninth grade social studies class was we'd
beat we were just supposed to read the newspaper for
like fifteen minutes in the morning, and I remember reading
I think it was about the sex pistols and like
moving like traveling through the Dallas Airport and just like
(06:22):
all the commotion. It was like ruckus that they're like
causing and I looked at them. I was like, that
looks interesting. It's like I went from you know, like
my America Records and my Elo Records everything that changed everything,
you know, so I started I'd have to go to
Natural Music, the hippie record store and in Bimidgie and
(06:45):
order all these weird records, and it was there was
something great about like, you know, having to order a
record and actually having to wait. You know, there was
just like this there was this excitement. It's like I
couldn't wait to get home from high school, like to
pick up my records that I ordered like two weeks ago,
you know.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
I you know, I remember doing that with like Columbia
House Records, right you Yeah, hear a song that you liked,
didn't get the album, and then you had to it's
gonna be here any day now.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sometimes like seeing at more than retail crap.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
I'm pretty sure every kid in the universe probably had
an unpaid bill to Columbia House somewhere. Yeah, that's funny.
So what were some of those bands that you were
picking those records up in ordering? Beside sex Pistles?
Speaker 2 (07:30):
It was like, yeah, sex Pistols. I mean I got
into like that first wave of the English punk rock,
like the Vibrators, Stranglers, what else, the weird one before
punk rock, and I like them just because they were
different and it was just sort of my my band
in ninth grade because it was just different. Was Bbop Delocks?
(07:50):
What did I see in this? It's just I mean,
I don't get it. Some of it's all right, but
I was like, I don't know why I bought all
those records in myso investment in it other than I
was just being you know, a contry.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
Love that band.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
Yeah, I mean there's things about them that are they're cool,
but it's like, yeah, I look back at a lot
of that like Glund stuff, and it's like the theater
element could be could have been dialed down a notch
and a lot of that stuff Bowie included, you know.
I mean, it's like Bowie was great. He's like he
treaded that line of theater and like like and experimental
music pretty well, but there's times where it was just like, yeah,
(08:25):
this isn't much different than Godspell.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
So did you end up planning in a band while
you were up there, did you know?
Speaker 2 (08:33):
I mean I had some like derelict friends that I'd
get together with and we'd like hang on their parents'
garage and like make a racket, but it was never
there wasn't there. Yeah, there just weren't enough. Nobody really
had their there the shipped together enough to have like
an actual like drum kit or a guitar, and yeah,
it's just there wasn't and there wasn't an outlet for
(08:56):
it really, you know. It was just like, yeah, we'd
get together and like a guitar and kind of bashed
through cars, covers and things like that. But yeah, that
didn't really happen until I moved to Minneapolis, when that
happened slowly. But yeah, yeah, Like going back to the
record stuff, it's like that branched out into like, oh yeah,
I remember getting Talking Heads and seventy seven and the
(09:18):
first Gang of Four record at like I think it
was it wasn't called hotle Likes at the time. It
was the one that done on seventh and nannaupin Ah. God,
what was it called back then? Maybe it was hot
like still then. But yeah, I remember getting those records
and I was just sort of like puzzled. I didn't
really I mean, I didn't dislike it, but it was
just like it wasn't there was no point of reference
(09:39):
for it. So it was it's like the other stuff,
just like they're just like snotty rock and roll records.
It wasn't really that much with Jump, but I was
into being progressive. Yeah, but the one that really popped
my mind was like seeing DVA on Saturday Night Live
and that that really just popped my cork.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
Yeah, just unlike anything else to come before.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
Yeah. No, And I still watch that and it's like
I my my partner's sister saw it and she's like,
that's weird. I'm like, yeah, in this day and age,
it's still something completely other. And I really like that
about them at the time.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
It's funny because I have a couple of kids, and
you know, I was introduced them to different music. Tonight.
It was I was showing my ten year old daughter
the Fleetwood Max Silver Springs thing and explaining the whole
Lindsay Buckingham, she was like kind of cool. Yeah, yeah,
so she was kind of speaking of theater right exactly.
(10:39):
But it's just funny to think about because usually when
you go back on some of these bands, you have
to say, like, you know, for the time, this was
really kind of amazing or shocking or nothing. But like
the Goo yeah whatever, this is not shocking. But I'm
like Devo still. If you see that, you're like, what
a bizarre band?
Speaker 2 (10:58):
Divo? Yeah No, And it's like I had artsy inclinations
and that had all of it, you know, and it's
like I wanted to be Devo. It was it was the.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
Whole package, get the flower pot, the theater.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Was right, you know. I mean yeah, it was like
I can't think it was letter bangs. I basically called
them kiss for college kids, and he was right, but
you know, I wasn't in college yet I didn't care.
It was like it was the yellow suits. Man. They
did me in the leisure suits too. After that were good,
but then after I kind of lost track after the
first couple of records. Yeah, but once once I was vindicated,
all my high school square like friends started listening to
(11:32):
Whip It, I was like, all right, my job's done.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Next I'm moving along culture.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
Yes, now I'm into discharge and Prince.
Speaker 1 (11:46):
Hell, I've got there. You go, well, what's that got the.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Oh nice, Wow, that's a good one. That's a good
choice of tattoo. I never thought about that.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
Yeah, Prince is my that was by it as a
kid where it was the first music that I heard
and that I was like, holy cow. Then it was
the Beatles.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Yeah, dirty Mind was really caught me. And I was like,
I mean because it was like that's when he started
hanging out First Avenue and was picked like ripping off
Lawyer Barbaro's style and like punking it up just a
little bit, you know. That that caught my attention. And
then I was living with a guy named Chris Tack
at the time, and he used to play in the
a band called Nakarima who played up in Northeast with
(12:29):
like Grand Central and all that. He was a horn player. Wow.
But I remember I was living with I lived with
him for like a year and a half and he
got a call from Mark Brown was who was in
Nakarima with him or no Grand Central, I can't remember,
but they were bandmates. But he was like, hey, I
just got a gig with Prince. He went like, you
want to come down and see me. I'm like, we're
playing at First Avenue. I'm like, my roommate invited me.
(12:51):
It was for the it was a rehearsal show, like
unnounced rehearsal show for controversy, and I was not prepared
for I mean, I liked those records, but it was
just like I was mind blown. I had no idea,
Like how fucking could he was.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
There's nobody else like that now really like he took
pieces of what other people could do, but that whole
package together was unlike anybody.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
It's funny I work at UNC now and that there's
some people I know that work at the Southern Historical
Collection which are like Doug. I mean, they keep like
special collections of all like you know, like old like
slave owner material, blah blah blah. But it's it's it's
an amazing collection. But one of the curate of the
assistant curators there's like how it's like Prince should have
(13:39):
been from Durham, Minneapolis. I don't get it. I'm like sorry,
I mean, if he wasn't, if he wasn't Durham. That
wouldn't have been the same thing. You know, it's like
Atlanta whatever. It's like, yeah, you would think he should
have come from the South. I mean, I guess Andre
three thousand, it's a good argument for similar but it's like,
but Andre three thousand would have been Andre three thousand
(13:59):
with Prince. But it's just something about that environment in
Minnesota that like, Yeah, I mean there's it's hard to
know where all that came from. I mean, and I'm
to this day grateful that that happened under like one roof,
because I mean I wouldn't. It didn't dawn me until
like what probably about when he like just before he died.
That without that going on, I don't think anybody would
(14:24):
have paid attention to what was going on in Minneapolis. Yeah,
it's like replacement Schoosker Dupe, they all. I mean, the
spotlight was on that club.
Speaker 1 (14:33):
Yeah, it's pretty amazing. Did you ever get to meet
the guy?
Speaker 2 (14:37):
I would run into him frequently at First Avenue, But
it's like, like somebody just asked me that recently. I
was like, but meet now, But I mean it's like
you would run into him. He kept to himself. I
mean he was really only interested in, you know, the girls.
You didn't really hang out with the dudes. You know.
It's like, yeah, it's like, yeah, I I remember crashing.
(15:01):
We crashed into each other at the like he was
coming up the stairs and I was going downstairs at
the First Avenue one night, just like like we smashed
right into each other and he's like, excuse me. He
just sort of like minted ground in his bolt high
heels and went upstairs. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
I stood next to him a few times, but I
just couldn't get myself to say anything because I was
it was.
Speaker 2 (15:19):
Like his vibe was so intimidating. It's like it was
a tiny guy, but it was like I don't know
what that what possessed that body, but it was a
force to be reckoned with.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
Yeah, and I And for me it was like just
being a fan since I was like four, I'm like,
what if he says something that I don't like? Yeah,
because you'd always hear the stories, like as you were
saying women when I was being like he was just
the sweetest, and then you would hear somebody else it
wasn't a woman. We're like have a not so great story. Yeah, Yeah,
(15:52):
I like your new album, what's your point? You're like,
I don't really want that vibe, So I'm like, I'm
just gonna enjoy the fact that somebody who doesn't seem
like they're actual human being is just walking down the
hall right now. That's bizarre.
Speaker 2 (16:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
Yeah, So how did you get into bands? How did
you meet the bands?
Speaker 2 (16:09):
It was all just I mean, I my intent, Like
I started out like once I left a midgie, I
had a I got into AMCAD. My intention was to
you know, get a degree, start making album covers. I
was really into album art, specifically the seventies coming out
of England called hypnosis, like storm Time and that stuff.
(16:33):
It was like really, I mean I was basically ripping
them off. That's how I got into arts school. But
in that like that was in nineteen eighty and right
around that, I was hanging out at Orfolk Daily. Of
course at that point that because I was a hard
not yeah, I mean it's like calling through the usbins
and like having them hold way too many records for
(16:53):
me all the time. But but yeah, I mean through
those people, I started going to like Jay's Long or Zoogies.
At the it wasn't the Longhorn anymore to see the
replacements and new screw and L seven three, which was
you know, it was left of It was Chris Osgood's
next thing, and yeah, I just started meeting people like
crazy and it just caught me. And m KAD was
(17:19):
kind of in a weird point of flux at that
point in time, and it's like I really wanted to
get into video and Litho they were really pushing me
towards design because I needed to make money blah blah blah,
and also there's just so much infighting with the faculty
and staff there. I was just I just like, I'm
just gonna take a year off and hang out in
this music thing. So I just started going out and
it's like the vibe was like really good friends with
(17:42):
Terry Katzman at the time, and through him I met
Bob mauld and everybody else from there on, and then
probably the biggest one was Chris Johnson from Rifle Sport
and then you know the Man's Eyes guys, and it's like, yeah,
I just ended up like hanging out with the Chris
Rifle Sport guys a lot, and then living with Pete
and Gerard for a while. And through them. I met
(18:05):
through Chris, I met the Man Sized guys, and then
just one day went over to practice with Chris and
drank Beert those guys, and Tony was like, strap on
a guitar, and it's like I just happened to know
all the songs already because Bob was well, Bob had
been working on the their first record, and I mean
it's like I was just sort of playing along. He's like,
I can to do this stuff. But it's like, yeah,
I sat down with them one night and Tony was like,
(18:26):
why don't you join the band? I was like, Okay, you.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
Just love those like early life decisions. That sounds like something.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
Yeah, yeah, of course, yeah, you're in a recording studio
making a record.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
I mean it was It's funny to think about, how
I mean, it seemed like a long time at the time,
but it really wasn't you. It was like all that
happened in just a few years. It's it's crazy, just
how long in Man Size. Yeah. Uh, that's a good
question because it was on again, off again. I mean
(19:03):
Tony had had like left to go back to school
right around the time. I mean that decision was made
right like it was terrible because it's like, you know,
like Homestead essentially was putting it out and we had
to tell Gerard Cosloy that, well, we've been telling them
that we were breaking up until after the record came up.
(19:27):
But yeah, it was unfortunate timing. But yeah, but then
it's like, yeah, we got back together after I think
after because I think he had beenished school after a
year maybe, and we started playing out again for a while,
and I don't remember how long that lasted. But it's
just like it wasn't it was the dynamic wasn't quite
as explosive. It's like, I mean I was hung up
(19:49):
because like all that stuff was just like it just
that second EP that I made them was it was
just so easy that stuff just like kind of fell
out of the ether. And then the second time it's
like I don't know if I had some kind of
block and I just couldn't come up with stuff anymore. Yeah,
I don't know what it was. It wasn't that it
was like amazing or anything like that, but I think
(20:11):
I was just overthinking it or something. I don't know.
It just it just never quite Nothing that we came
up after that was quite worthwhile.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
I don't know, was that kind of the end of
the band at that point.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
Yeah, yeah, and then people are just sort of like,
you know, Tippy lost interest. I mean, we all lost
interested various points, and we just sort of drifted. But
we'd still come back Creaking Bean and play together every
now and then. But it's like it's yeah, we couldn't
get it together to do anything more beyond that. And
then Tony and I got into We're in Breaking Circus
for a while. It's like, yeah, it's like because we
(20:44):
were tight with that whole Chicago scene like Rifle, sport Man, Sized,
Naked Rega and Big Black, it's like that that network
was started.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
I actually had an Albedi on here at one point.
That was a fun conversation.
Speaker 2 (20:57):
Yeah. Now I owe a lot to him too. It's
just like I know a lot to like Terry Katzman,
Chris Johnson, uh, Bob Mold, Steve Albini. I mean it's like, well,
lout Steve, I wouldn't have been able to navigate well.
And Pizzotti Jeff Pizotti a certain point too. It's like
Jeff Pizotti was sort of like the first person from
(21:18):
Chicago that I was not intimidated by. He was actually
really open and friendly and made Chicago seem more liberal
than it actually was. It was I mean, I was,
I mean I had I had a pretty healthy dose
of anxiety in the eighties, and it's like when Chicago
just terrified me, New York City terrified me too for
the first few times I went. And it's like, and
(21:39):
you don't have money and there were no credit cards
or cell phones or anything.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
So yikes, yikes. Yeah, how did you get into the
studio work?
Speaker 2 (21:50):
That's like I got into that. It's like the first
time I saw got into that was like when Bob
Mold didn't a rifle sport ep that never came out.
I don't know what happened to those recordings, but it
was essentially the same thing that was Voice of Reason
their first record. But they did it the children's theater
studio liked the eight track up in the children's theater, okay,
(22:14):
and that was pretty cool. I mean, that's like I
remember that. I don't know if they ever officially mixed that.
But then I don't know, for some reason, they just
decided to go to Black Gray Way and do it
for real. I mean, just help it because for whatever reason.
But that was the first time I like hearing like
full three to somebody, like people that I knew making music,
(22:35):
like in like hearing full three dimensional sound playback coming
over the speakers and just like and me being a
seventies stereo like kid, it was just like, oh, wow,
I know what I want to do.
Speaker 3 (22:48):
It.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
Yeah, that was it. Yeah, that was really it. And
then and then yeah I wasn't. I wasn't there for
the Man's side first Man Sized Recordings. I didn't know
them yet then, but then well yeah, by the time
I got into the studio with them for their second
their second EP, it's like I was elbows up to
the board and probably I mean, I had a lot
of ideas. I'd read Mix Magazine and I knew it
(23:09):
digital delays were from reading that, and I knew what
gated reaverb was and all this stuff, and I just
had ideas of things that I wanted to try out
and apply to the second the set of Man Sized recordings,
And I'm sure I drove Steve's Felstead crazy because I
wanted the board and I was like, let's do this,
let's do this. I'm hear it let me do this,
just I don't know why I didn't. I just sort
(23:30):
of had an instinct for it. But it's like, I'm
not I wasn't schooled in it by any chance, by
any means, never was. I mean, I had intended to
go after I had kind of gotten into that. I
had intentions of going to New York too. There was
a place called the Institute of Audio Research that I
was curious about going to. But then it's just like
(23:51):
I never got around to it, and I just got busy
like working and doing it being in music. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
Yeah, So I it was funny because I've the way
your name came up for this. I don't know if
you listened to the Dan Murphy episode that I just
did a few, Yeah, I check that out. Yeah. So
the funny thing is, so I started this in twenty
twenty when no one could do anything, including myself. So
I'm like, wow, something to do. And I had your
(24:18):
name on a on a notebook piece of paper because
I'm like, I should find that guy and reach out
and see if he wants to do this, And then,
you know, didn't get around to it, and then Dan
mentioned you on that episode. A couple of weeks ago,
and I'm like, oh, yeah, and then you will. Then
you liked my post about it, and I'm like, well,
there he is, tracked him down. Here we are now,
(24:38):
so here we are now. So yeah, he was mentioning you,
I think you had done the original Runaway Train demo
for that when they.
Speaker 2 (24:46):
First Yeah, I mixed while you were out, sort of
co produced with with Chris Osgod, and I feel like
somebody else was in on that. Maybe it was just
Chris and fells Dead. But then yeah, but then they
for some reason they wanted me to mix it. I
(25:07):
don't know why, but I did. Ended up redoing a
couple of things that they weren't quite one hundred percent
happy with, but it's like yeah, and then yeah, we
did demos for once their a M contract. So we
did a bunch of like demos for which essentially this
is all the stuff that the begame Runaway Train, and
(25:28):
they were all very acoustic based, and I was I
was really trying to convince them just like just release
this as it is and run with the money, but
you know, they didn't want to do that. They wanted
a big record deal. They ended up being the right choice.
Speaker 1 (25:41):
Yeah, hell worked out for him.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
I would say it did. Long term maybe not, but
for the instant a lot of cash.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
It did, Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
He mentioned that your demo of it sounded very similar
to the one that actually came out.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
In some regards maybe, but the drum sound probably wasn't
as quite as nineties probably right.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
So you also did Slim Dunlaps first record as well,
the old name. I noticed that when I was looking
at it, So tell me about that. How did you
start working with Slim?
Speaker 2 (26:16):
That was born out of my relationship with Peter Jasperson.
I've done it, I guess at that point it's like
I was working for one of the Raycho disc people
at the time, Rob Simon's who had done east Side Digital.
I was working at the east Side Digital ESD thing,
(26:37):
which almost went under and is a part of like
trying to get the company back a float after Best
Buy like Crusted Us with Christmas returns. One year, He's like, hey,
I'll give you guys, I'll split the profits with you
guys if you can, like you get your sales up
to a certain point. And of course that was the
year that Recover released the started releasing the Bowie stuff.
(26:57):
So it wasn't really a problem to get the company
back about but we so he we got bonuses out
of that, and with those bonuses, I bought like uh,
an Otari eight track and an Amex scorpion board, just
in some micro handful of microphones to start, like well,
to hopefully make my own stuff. I'm still working on that.
That never happened, uh, But then yeah, that's that ended
(27:22):
up being like set up in the warehouses that Richo
we're in for quite a while and I just would
like I'd work there during the days and then at
five o'clock all the microphones and recording gear would come
out and we just started doing like I have. I
did a Joe Henry record up there short Man's Room,
and I think that's when Peter sort of realized it's like, oh,
(27:44):
this is cheaper than going to BlackBerry or and they
saw other stuff and this stuff sounds pretty good. So
I did a couple of medium cool records when he
was doing that, and then yeah, it was just he
wanted me to work on Slim's record too.
Speaker 1 (27:58):
Yeah, so Slim before the Stroke, my band High on Stress.
He asked us to back him on some shows for
his backing band. So yeah, it was really fun. But
I was trying to convince him at that time. I'm like,
you need the third solo record. When you're going to
do the third solo record, and he's like, I record weird.
So I was going to ask you, does he record weird?
(28:18):
I don't.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
It's hard to know. I mean, I don't. I think
he was writing a lot onto sort of Paul's sort
of style of tension at that point in time. It's like,
it doesn't, it didn't. He liked things that were born
out of like chaos intension, and I don't know if
(28:41):
that was like, if that's what he meant by being heir.
It was a style. It wasn't. It wasn't that was
for me. But it's like and also it's like, yeah,
he cast intention, but he also needed guidance, and after
a while he was just frustrated because like nobody was
giving him guidance. And I finally was just like, all right,
here I go, I'm die giving you guidance and just
(29:03):
kind of coax them through things, push them through, and
it took him a while. I think the only reason
we actually got that one finished is because Jesus. I
think I was three months into it at least, and
so it was just like it just seemed like one
of those things that was just going to go on
forever and then things will get worse in the future.
(29:26):
Three months that's nothing, but what I got a call
from Uncle Tupla at that point in time for their
Warner Brothers debut. They wanted to interview me for that,
and then I went to Chicago, interviewed them, accepted the offer,
and then all of a sudden there was a deadline
for Slim. I was like, I got to go do this.
It's like, if you want to, if you want, I'm
(29:46):
not going to be able to help you beyond this date.
And that's I think that's Without that happening, I don't
know how we would have finished. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:55):
I think sometimes people just need that deadline to feel
the crunch to get things done.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
There.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
I know a ton of people like that were even
working on the same album for ten years. It's like,
you just gotta just gotta get it done, make it.
Speaker 2 (30:07):
Yeah, it's it's it's hard. I mean out I know,
it's like I haven't done anything since forty some years ago,
and it's like I put it around a lot here,
but it's like there's no deadlines, there's no demand. It's
just sort of like now I'm just treated like that's
just therapy.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
It's fine, That's kind of what it is anyway. But yeah,
it really was that and a Dyne that you did.
Yeah record, Okay, And what was that like? Is that
was that their last? No? Yeah, that was their last record?
Speaker 2 (30:35):
That was it? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (30:37):
So what was that like in the studio at that time,
because obviously things got a little it was on that tour.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
It was interesting because it's like, yeah, I mean I
think that tension existed, but I was naive. Uh it was.
I mean it was great because I mean they were
they wanted to. I mean, I loved I. It wasn't
completely sold on the first two records, but I really
liked March. I liked the acoustic approach on that. I
(31:03):
don't know why it resonated with me. I think it's
just at that point in time, I was really getting
tired of like the sort of macho manliness that like
was coming out of Chicago and just like negative negativity
and like edge lord shit, you know.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
It was a little bit a little bit different vibe
at that time than yeah, and it's like and that
started to creep into the minneapoliscene too, and it just
sort of bummed me out.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
I was just like, man, it was like, these bands
are good before this crept in. It's like, I don't
dislike that stuff, but not everything has to be like that.
So like, the opportunity to work on an acoustic string
band seemed like the perfect punk rock thing to do. Yeah,
in response to all the edge Lord takeover and Yeah,
(31:46):
it's like I got there and they they wanted to
return to Uncle Tuople, wanted to return to making a
rock record. It's like they wanted to get back to it.
Like it it's like it was all a lot of
loud guitars blah blah blah. But unfortunately the studio we
went to in Austin, Texas wasn't really big enough to
accommodate that. It was pretty tight. I mean, we could have,
but it's like I just for some reason I couldn't.
I wasn't pumped about like how things were sounding in
(32:08):
that format. And then I'd be like, all right, just
give me a break. I'm gonna move I'm gonna move
stuff around like I was trying to reconfigure stuff so
like the Bleed made sense and situated people that needed
to be isolated differently. And I'd be doing that and
then i'd go into the lounge or I'd be like
just going run through stuff in lounge, and I go
in the lounge and they'd be running through its string
band style. I'd be like, hang on a second, this
(32:31):
sounds way better than what you're trying to do there
as a rock band. I mean, it's like, can we
please try this string band stuff? And it's like, I mean,
Jay wasn't pumped on that someways. I mean, I think
the only the one that I really kind of regret
pushing that on was probably sixteen Keys. Yeah, it's it's
it works, but I mean I think it probably would
have been better as a rock song, but the majority
(32:53):
of the material sounded so much better like string band style.
Speaker 1 (32:57):
Did you get much pushback from them trying to get
towards that direction.
Speaker 2 (33:02):
No? Surprisingly, I mean as I got to know them more. Surprisingly, No,
because I don't know what it was they were willing
to be pushed and not And I mean, and it's
weird for me. It's like that's usually not my styles
to push for. I mean, we were both a comedy
like being polite. I guess I wasn't being polite by pushing,
(33:25):
but it's I just like was just saying what I heard.
I mean, I just liked what I was hearing in
the lounge of the studio more than what I like
hearing or coming across the speakers. Ginas our junior style.
Speaker 1 (33:38):
That would have been a much different record that way,
that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (33:41):
Yeah, yeah, no, it really would have. I mean, well
you get you get some of it. It's like like
we've been had as got like the rock like sloppy
rock vibe, and it's just like, yeah, something about Jay's numbers.
They just weren't breathing right. And I think part of
that might have been just like, uh, it was Ken
Komer's first go with him, and it's like, and this
(34:03):
is something I learned much later that uh, you know,
Kuomer was definitely a loud drummer, and something I noticed
after working with Mike Hydorn on Sunball Records is that
he sort of followed Jay. He wasn't leading Jay, he
wasn't setting a bed for Jay to play on. He
was following Jay's right hand. It's sort of like how
(34:25):
Spencer Tweedy plays with Jeff Tweety. It's just like there's
this natural synergy between like the their internal rhythms and
it just works. And Ken didn't like Ken's great, but
that that that's synergy of like following Jay's right hand
just wasn't there, and I didn't know to look for
that at the time.
Speaker 1 (34:43):
Yeah, new drummers could change the ballgame completely.
Speaker 2 (34:46):
Yeah. No, I mean we got it to work, but
it took. It just took some doing, you know.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
Yeah, So how long did that record take?
Speaker 2 (34:54):
That was only like two or three weeks recording and mixing.
I mean it was I mean we we we said
very punk rocket ethos and like it was, there was
all live. There were zero puncheons, zero overdups. I mean
that was That's what made it like a little easier.
Speaker 1 (35:11):
Do you typically record more live.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Or yeah, it depends, it depends. I've been through the
gamut of all that. And at the end of the day,
I mean I haven't been in the studio or made
a record in like seven years now since I started
working at uncause it was just too hard to balance.
But it's like I was really I mean, especially as
you know, things like the availability of doing it yourself
(35:36):
at home and driving yourself bananas became a thing, a
foundation of just some sort of human interplay I think
is crucial to any kind of energy in it, like
any kind of music that like is a band quote unquote.
I mean it's like give and take because like it's
getting in and polishing everything up like piece by piece.
(35:58):
It's just it's hard to get it to feel right. Ever,
you know, you can get it nice. But but yeah,
just like finding the right elements to get like some
give and take in a live, live environment. Really it's
so helpful.
Speaker 1 (36:13):
Well, some producers don't, Like they'll tell the artists don't
even demo anything like come in here and let's figure
it out. Are you that way or do you feel
like you get.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
You know, that's that's a tough call too. I mean,
I think it depends on the musicianship and people that
are open to the process. I think, now, yeah, given
given the it really depends on the people involved in
what they're after. I mean, given my brothers, I would
probably try both ways and not be labor I mean,
the main thing is not to belabor anything. Ever, you know,
(36:44):
keep things moving, don't don't ever get hung up. If
you're hung up and you're stuck and you're polishing a
tured why that's not fun.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
The worst record my band has ever made was the
one we were the most prepared for. And I always
remember that because we're interesting. Tempo's gonna be you know,
we're gonna go one twenty, we're gonna lock that in,
we're gonna practice to it, and just there is.
Speaker 2 (37:06):
Something about capturing that moment of discovery and it's it's,
I don't know what it is. It's like they like
there's a golden small record or like the last one
I did with them that had oh, since you came along? Yeah,
what was that called? Anyways, carry Lewis on? But until
(37:27):
you came along something I've got him from blanking on
the name of it.
Speaker 3 (37:31):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (37:32):
But there was a sloppy earlier take of that that
I just loved and they were just not having it. Yeah.
I tried to get Dickinson, Jim Dickinson to convince them
that that was the better take than the one that
We're there. Just like everything was just like really locked
down tight, you know, it's just like never bought it
I think they've realized a little later with like the
charms of the original like scrappy take.
Speaker 1 (37:56):
It's hard to let that stuff go because now I
know I could do that better, but like most of
the time that's a better take, it's more interesting to
listen to.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
Yeah, it's been a really that kind of thing has
been a real learning experience for me, just like kind
of puttering around my own home here. It's like, since
I I keep myself entertained, it's like I should have
done this so long ago, but I was always busy
engineering and producing. But it's like it would have helped
me with being like more empathetic with the other side
of the glass. But it's like just like yeah, just
like really seeing what works and what doesn't, and really
(38:27):
learning not to be too precious about things and not
getting hung up on my new show. It's like so
important not to go down those holes. Right.
Speaker 1 (38:35):
So obviously Tupelo loved the record you made because they
you know, once they split up, you made the first
sun Volt and the first Welcome record, right, so yeah.
Speaker 2 (38:44):
That was that was the end. I actually made one
more day, that's right.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
Yeah, Yeah, you made the two first two sun volts, right,
and then the first.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
Yeah, but I was trying to do the right thing
and you be all corporate and get a lawyer and
stuff like that, and the lawyer charged too much money,
and I think that's scared J off. So whatever after that, Yeah,
but yeah, yeah, I mean, but I did that record.
Joe McEwan and Warner Brothers was none too happy about
that decision for both of them to work with me again.
Speaker 1 (39:14):
Really now, how come?
Speaker 2 (39:17):
I mean, I think in his mind it's like he
he would have preferred them to work with like Tom
Petty's people, like either Dracuilius or Richard Dodd. He was
really into Richard Dodd at the time, which we did have,
like we incorporated Richard in both, like the mixing of
both those records just sort of like a that was
sort of a compromise that was met, you know, and
(39:38):
it was it was fine. It's like I started to
like lose track of my own aesthetic in that and
just like what I was supposed to do, like working
for more money and more time and for like Warner
Brothers wasn't happy when you just handle them a record
that you'd worked on for two weeks since like and
you hadn't spent all the money. You know, It's like,
are you sure? This is it? Like life happy? Why
(40:01):
are we not supposed to be happy? You know? Then
you start Then I started second guessing like crazy, and
it's like my work really suffered because I wasn't ever
whatever I was doing was never good enough for the
guns at Warner Brothers. So, I mean, I really that
messed me up for quite a while, and I would
look in retrospect. I looked back to records I was
doing three years previous to that, and they were totally fine.
(40:22):
I was probably my best work, because I would it
was just I was just at that point before I
was getting like really super critical feedback with from people
that just could not be pleased unless it was like
there people that were doing the work.
Speaker 1 (40:34):
Yeah. Well, it's a similar story at Albedian. Then Utero really.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Like yeah, now that that stuffs crushing, man, it messes
you up. I remember, like Steve was that messed him up.
It's just like he's like, what am I going to do?
I'm like, dude, you could also go back to journalism
and it's like what do you do anyway? He's like, no,
I'm a record producer. I'm like, okay, but yeah, no,
it's that stuff is like it's ego crushing. It's like
(40:58):
the first things like getting over ego, like blows like that.
It took it took me years. I don't know if
I ever did get over it. It's just it's like
now I know. It's like I got to the point
where it's like mixes took me entirely too long because
that's so neurotic about it.
Speaker 1 (41:14):
Which of those two records did you make first? Was
it AM or was it?
Speaker 2 (41:17):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (41:18):
AM was first? Okay, and you had that kind of
a front row seat to a strange time of you know,
parting of two bands and then having those two projects.
Speaker 2 (41:28):
Yeah. Yeah, it was really unfortunate because I didn't know.
I couldn't choose sides. What was I supposed to do?
I mean, I liked both of them. I was probably
a little bit closer to Jeff. We were actually putting,
you know, buds for a bit.
Speaker 1 (41:43):
It seems like he's a little more outgoing and probably
easier to.
Speaker 2 (41:46):
Yeah, and he was like and he was pushing in
an envelope and in a way that my my punk
rock self appreciated. I was worth like futurism and like
mowing over boundaries. I like that. But yeah, but yeah,
Jay was Yeah, it was just really unfortunate. And then
(42:07):
when I worked with Jay that was like that that
was kind that really bummed Jeff out too.
Speaker 1 (42:11):
So I was gonna say it was alreny hard feelings
about you being.
Speaker 2 (42:15):
Yeah, I mean as good to meet as he could be,
but he was really really not happy about it at all.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
Yeah, I can imagine that's just yeah, it's supposed to do,
I mean, a fortunate spot to be in, but also
a very.
Speaker 2 (42:33):
It was awkward. Yeah, but I was so busy I
couldn't get caught up and the drama of it, it
didn't matter to me.
Speaker 1 (42:40):
Yeah. Well then after that, like I'm you know, looking
at It's funny because I've talked to a few people producers,
and it's fun because there's always the records that you're like,
I want to talk to that person because they were
you know, they did this record, that record, and then
you go down the rabbit hole and you're like, whoa,
there's a bunch of other stuff on here. I didn't
even realize they were a part of it. And I
did the same thing with you so like, you worked
(43:01):
with Magna Pop, which I had Ruthie on here at
one point.
Speaker 2 (43:04):
She's great, She's amazing.
Speaker 1 (43:06):
I love Ruthie, loved Ruthie. She was fun. And then, uh,
you work with Beck on a song for Odalay, which
I didn't know that either. How did that come about?
That's that was an interesting one.
Speaker 2 (43:18):
Yeah, I would imagine that was that came about because
of Joey Werenker. Okay, they were They had a day
off in Minneapolis when they're doing touring Mellow Gold, and
Joey just called me. It's like, hey, do you have
a do you want to can you get us into
a studio for a day. I'm like, yeah, sure, and
uh so we went to Terrarium for a day and
(43:39):
Beck wanted to record a bunch of Blue Standards with
Ray and Glover. Huh so we we set up and
we did that and it was just basically an afternoon
and like we got it done and then backs like
you want to keep going and I'm make sure. He's
like I just want us throw some weird stuff, you know.
It's like so we so we've got we went from
like these really just sort of like live in the
studio Acoustic Blue Standards, and then then things got crazy
(44:03):
and it's like all right, let's blow up the drums.
It's like overload the mixing. Guess great, all right, now
what do we We were just layering just like all
kinds of weird stuff, and it was like it was
a blast, and he just liked that. I wasn't wasn't
afraid to go from one extreme to the other, you know,
And and quickly.
Speaker 1 (44:23):
A strange point of time for him, from you know,
mellow Gold to Odal like well, Gold's odd, it's an
odd record, but like, yeah, it was quite a turn
right there.
Speaker 2 (44:34):
Yeah. I wasn't sure what he was about yet at
that point. And then yeah, so, I mean that was
right about right before I moved to North Carolina. And
then when I moved to North Carolina, they they wanted
me to go to Los Angeles to spend a week
recording uh, live band stuff. I was like, all right,
(44:55):
sure out there, Yeah they were, they were. They were
doing the majority of the work with the with the
Dust Brothers, but he wanted to do some other stuff. Mean, well,
well he had a bunch of other Yeah, there was
like three sessions going he was doing stuff with Rob Schnapp. Uh,
there was I think there's one other production team. There's
like four studios who were like working on Mellow Gold
(45:18):
or not Melo Gold, but odal A. But when I
got to Los Angeles, it's like the time and been
booked at the Beastie Boys studio ge Son And when
I got there, I'm like, hey, I'm Brian, you were
to work with beck And it was Mario Caldatto sitting
in the mixing guest was like what, I'm like, I'm
Brian Paulson. I'm here to work with Beckham. They were
supposed to be recording a live band. He's like they
told me I was doing that. I'm like, oh, and
(45:41):
it was apparently Joey was apparently not too pleased. But
it's like the beck thought would be funny to put it,
put us together, just just to see what would happened. Yeah,
without telling us.
Speaker 1 (45:50):
He's like throwing a banjo on a funk song.
Speaker 2 (45:53):
Yeah, No, it was funny. And then of course there
wasn't a live band. It was just sort of like,
you know, he and Joey just sort of layering stuff.
But we got into a groove with it, and but
it was all this like it was it was all
like that crazy stuff like we didn't like post like
Rand Glover sessions. It was like layers. We just do
a song a day and just like fill up the
(46:14):
twenty four track and just sort of like weed through
stuff and then just mix it quickly at the end
of the day and that was it.
Speaker 1 (46:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:22):
I remember after a week of that, I'm like, oh
my god, what is happening. I was enjoying it. But
then it's like Mark Katz from Jeff and it's like, hey,
I'm a sting swing by and check the stuff out.
I was like, oh no, it's supposed to be like
the follow up to Mellow Gold, and like like I
was like Mark.
Speaker 1 (46:37):
We're loser part too. It's like I pulled him aside immediately.
Speaker 2 (46:41):
He's like just so you know, stuff's kind of out there,
and he's like, no, that's all right, man. It's like
we're not looking for hits. I mean, he's he's Dylan Dust.
We're in this for the long haul. I'm like, well, good,
because here you go. You know. It's like, but yeah,
the only track that ended up on the record was
(47:04):
was it minus I Forget? But yeah, but I mean,
there was a couple of cracks on there. There wasn't
one called thunder Peel that was amazing that didn't make
the record. It finally came out on some some other
compilation later.
Speaker 1 (47:15):
But yeah, yeah, I was gonna ask did any of
that other stuff end up on any B sides.
Speaker 2 (47:20):
Or Yeah, all of it eventually came out. I think
there was probably like seven eight songs that we did.
Speaker 1 (47:26):
Oh that's cool, very cool. But but it's like, yeah,
is he to work with at that time or what's that?
Speaker 2 (47:32):
Like?
Speaker 1 (47:32):
He was back pretty easy to work with that time?
Speaker 2 (47:34):
Yeah, No, I mean it was really his process. That's
where I learned to not be so precious about stuff.
You know. It's like I love the way he would work.
It's just like lay it all down, it doesn't work out,
who cares move on? I might like it in a month,
I might not. I mean, it's just we're not thinking
about that. We're just just keep it rolling. And and
just the way he would just sort of like it's
(47:59):
where it's like when he be doing vocal takes or
just some things where he would just sort of like disappear.
You know, it's like all of a sudden, you could
like you could assume sort of like leaving his body
and going to this weird creative space and and then
he'd be done to the take and then you'd ask
me a question. You could assume he'd just like kind
of come back into his Body's like, oh yeah, what
you know. It's like like wow, this guys the trip,
you know, but amazing, you know. But it's really it
(48:21):
was really key to see me like how he worked
and he just would just not be precious about it.
And and it's like if you didn't get it today,
it's like you would just not labor what you had
done today, you would try it a different way two
weeks later.
Speaker 1 (48:37):
Yeah, oh wow. And then the other one that I noticed,
it's it's funny this other thing, as I mentioned, I
had Ruthie On and I had Steve On, I had
Matt On from Archers Alf. I saw that you did
a loaf from Yeah you're in the neighborhood, I suppose.
Speaker 2 (48:57):
Yeah, yeah, no, I came down here and still Bob
Weston's business.
Speaker 1 (49:02):
I'll show them.
Speaker 2 (49:03):
I gave it Mark Well, he is fair.
Speaker 1 (49:06):
Which which records did you do? Is that all the
nation's airports is one of them.
Speaker 2 (49:09):
Yeah, all the nation's airports and white trash heroes.
Speaker 1 (49:12):
Nice and what was that like working with them? They're
such an interesting band too, and it probably kind of
fulfilled a little bit of your your artynis that you like.
Speaker 2 (49:20):
Oh god, yeah, Eric Bachman, Yeah, definitely the first one. Yeah,
airports is great. I mean that there was still very
much a functional band at that point, but it's like
they were sort of like starting starting to fray at
the edges, because I mean they've been on the road
for I don't know how many years by the time
we got around doing all the nations airports, and I
remember Eric giving me the demos to all the nation's
airports and I was like, uh, oh, this is great,
(49:44):
this is really great. This is different, this could be
this could we might have to be making some decisions
that won't be like entirely democratic or well received to
accomplish this dream.
Speaker 1 (49:58):
How So, just in style of the songs, just what.
Speaker 2 (50:01):
I mean, it was like, yeah, it was more much
more expansive, and it was clearly that it wasn't just like,
you know, in the style of Archers of Loaf, you know, yeah,
at all? Yeah, no, exactly, And we cut the beds
in Memphis, and then Eric and Matt and I went
to Richmond, Virginia to uh Sound of Music Studios and
(50:25):
just started like layering it up and just like making
it doing all kinds of crazy arty stuff, uh, including
having Joan Osborne sing backup vocals, which caused a bit
of a rub one of the many.
Speaker 1 (50:41):
I didn't know that.
Speaker 2 (50:43):
Yeah, no, I mean she's just part of a gang
vocal It's not really, but yeah, it's like we were
there for like two or three weeks, I think, just
like just like going to town on on that, on
those songs, and by the time that Eric and Mark
(51:05):
came back into the fold and heard it, they're like,
this is not Archer's Love. They were not They were
not receptive to the.
Speaker 1 (51:11):
Direction at all, which guys Mark.
Speaker 2 (51:14):
And Eric Johnson the other guitar player. Yeah, so I
can't remember how it was resolved, but.
Speaker 1 (51:23):
Yeah, that one took me a minute because exactly what
you just said. You know, I was such a big
fan of the EP, which is maybe my favorite. It's
such a good thing and VV and then that came out.
I was like, Wow, this is a left ter, Like
this is different than what they've done. Before, but now
I love it.
Speaker 2 (51:42):
It probably should have just been the first Crooked Fingers record,
but I'm not that record. I mean, I think in retrospect,
Matt was on board. That's when Matt really got serious
about his craft, which was really it was really nice
to see him step up like that.
Speaker 1 (51:55):
Yeah, he's a really nice guy. I was really important.
Speaker 2 (51:57):
He is a sweetheart. Yeah, I love I don't see
him often enough.
Speaker 1 (52:02):
Yeah, is that it?
Speaker 2 (52:06):
Yeah? I don't get it. Well, okay, four, I don't
get to Ashville very often.
Speaker 1 (52:10):
It's funny. I had the guy that I saint, Paul,
guy that I been friends with forever. He's the only
trim me on Archers alone from the nineties, and so
when I met with Matt, I you know who use
my co host, and it was just gear talk between
those two. I was just loving it. I'm just sitting
and I'm like, they're just this pedal and that pedal.
And then like, my friend Bill bought this pedal. And
(52:31):
then Matt's like, yeah, I get these bass straps or
I'm a bigger guy, so and Bill's a bigger guy,
so he bought the strap and like, yeah, they were
just pals. It was pretty fun to watch.
Speaker 2 (52:42):
So, yeah, it's funny. I had no idea of the
reach that those guys had. I was just figured they
were just, you know, another like small piece of the
thing that was happening in Chapel Hill. But it's like
a lot more reach than a lot of that stuff.
Speaker 3 (52:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (52:57):
I wish they'd come back around here in Minneapolis again.
They were scheduled for twenty twenty, then it was canceled.
I think you're going to do the Fine Line, which
I thought was kind of an interesting venue for them. Yeah,
as you know, but then they never They never rebooked
since then, so hopefully they'll come back around. I saw
it at the four hundred Bar though. That was a
(53:17):
lot of fun.
Speaker 2 (53:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (53:20):
What do you think of that new record of Theirs?
That's another one.
Speaker 2 (53:23):
Listen to the whole thing yet, I really, I really
dug the energy of the single. I mean it's still
I mean, they're still fully intact. It's it's wild.
Speaker 1 (53:31):
You know, it doesn't sound like Archers of Loaf, no,
like a song that does. And I was like, I
really like this record, but it sounds like a different
band again.
Speaker 2 (53:44):
Interesting. Yeah, So I think the one I've heard actually
is Raley Days.
Speaker 1 (53:48):
Yeah, yeah, and that was good.
Speaker 2 (53:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (53:52):
You got to put your your preconceived notions off to
the side before you pop it on. What an Archers
of Wolf record sounds like and then you hear it like,
this is chock full of good songs. Again, it's just
not right in the style that you think it's gonna be.
Speaker 2 (54:05):
Right. Yeah, it does. It does seem a little more conventional.
I guess in hindsight, it was funny I saw them
was the last. It wasn't like they would just play
at the Cat's Cradle here like within the last year. Yeah.
It's like I've been like deep in this like sort
of like techno and house groove for the past like
four or five years, digging into electronic music. And then
(54:26):
go and hear that again. I was like, oh my god, Okay,
rhythm right, no, no, no, no, rhythm uh it is
a rhythm of a sort. But it was like I
was sort of like, wow, this is sort of like
just like four guys playing four different songs and that
start and end at the same time. It's like somehow
it works, you know. It's just like some of those
songs that like I recorded and we realized why I
was having such a hard time mixing them because it's
(54:46):
like there's no real interplay. It's just like there's people
going out in these crazy directions around like with with
Eric in the middle.
Speaker 1 (54:57):
Well, the guitar playing on those songs, it's just bizarre.
Speaker 2 (55:02):
Yeah, yeah, EJ. I really like EJ. Like Eric Johnson's take.
It's just like it really throws you for a loop
in the best possible way.
Speaker 1 (55:12):
Yeah, there's nothing standard about it, that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (55:15):
No, no, no, it's it's funny because it's like it's
like they share a little bit of DNA with paulvo
you know. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (55:23):
Yeah, so you said that you're kind of not doing
much recording. I see you get your studio there, but
you're not doing much this.
Speaker 2 (55:31):
This is finally, this finally just got to this state
that it's in, uh before the families came to visit
for Christmas. It's like we bought this house uh six,
at least seven years ago this coming spring, and it's
like this stuff was all in boxes. Yeah, but now
it's like trying to figure out what it's going to
be and it's new incardination. Most of this will probably disappear.
Speaker 1 (55:57):
Just to make sure, it all turns on and then
you know throw.
Speaker 2 (55:59):
Yeah even if that yeah, as buyer beware as is.
But yeah, it's really interesting. It's like I've been It's
like one of my neighbors here is Brad Cook. I
don't know if you're familiar with him. He's part of
like the whole bone of Ara Camp.
Speaker 1 (56:14):
Oh okay.
Speaker 2 (56:15):
I think he's a producer that's doing real low. He
lives just like two blocks from me, and mat like
going over and helping him get set up with a
few things and just watching the way he works. I'm like, wow, damn,
things have really changed, you know. Yeah, I don't know
if I'm cut out for that. I don't want to
do the dirty work anymore. Mix maybe, but yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (56:35):
So when's the last time you recorded a band.
Speaker 2 (56:37):
It's been you said, wow, twenty I did a Mountain
Mur record. I mixed a Mountain Ur record, and then
another band and did a record with the band called
Paranoid Style, And I think it was twenty seventeen. That
was the last time. It wasn't an intentional cutoff date
or that wasn't like this is it, I'm not not
doing this. It was just off first slowed down considerably.
(57:01):
But then when offers had come in and be like, well,
we wanted to come to Seattle, I'm like, well, you know,
I've got this archiving gig at UNC now that takes
up a lot of my time. Yeah, so yeah, and
then yeah, it was just it was good to step
away because it's like, I I didn't really think feel
like I was bringing anything. At a point I was
like getting really I was just exhausted, and I've got
(57:22):
a really nasty perfectionist streak that I will it's impossible
to live up to my own standards. So I mean
it's like and for me to get happy with the record,
it's like and not after I could afford to like
just bring stuff home and mix it. It was a
painstaking process. And it's like and raising the bar on myself.
(57:44):
Every time I made a record, it was just it
was unsustainable. It wasn't it wasn't worth the sleepless nights.
It wasn't. I was driving myself absolutely crazy. It's like
I couldn't trying to top your every time you stepped
up to the plate. It's just not hell not healthy.
Speaker 1 (58:02):
Yeah, I kind of feel that writing songs. Yeah, you
just beat the hell out of yourself. You're The way
it works is you're a genius the moment you write it,
and then the next day you're trash. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (58:14):
I mean, that's that's what Beck's approach of, just like
not being precious about it. You just knock it out,
put it away. And that's Brad Brad Cook just did
that with a band that I worked with, one of
the last bands I worked with, also from Athens' Dategical
Future Birds. Oh yeah, and they were they were there's
a lot of I think there's like seven or eight
(58:35):
guys in that band, and I just mixed for them.
But it's like it sounds like it was like, you know,
it was a lot quite an undertaking just getting the
stuff to the point to be able to be mixed.
And even when I was mixing, it's like, oh, we
need another two overdubs and be like, oh god, it's
like we've got two days left to mix fourteen sons.
You know. It's one of those kinds of things. Yeah,
(58:55):
but he did something really smart with them. He he
realized that they I mean, they were on like they've
been on the frat circuit in the South forever and
they played together fantastically, so he just like he took
them to Sonic Branch in Texas. They cut it live,
very minimal overdubs, and he sent them home. He's like,
(59:16):
you're not going to hear any of this for two months.
They're like what, Like no, it's like trust me, And
sure enough they got back that there was just a
few things that they wanted to do to it, and
that was it. I mean when he played it for me,
I was like, don't even mix this, this is it.
It sounded so good. I was like, why don't don't
tempt fate? Leave it be? Yeah, what record is this?
(59:39):
It's a it's a record. It's not it should be
coming out and probably with a couple months. I would
imagine a band called Future Birds. Then something happened with
them inexplicably that nobody understands. It's like they're playing the
frat circu in the South forever. It's like, all of
a sudden, they're selling out Red Rocks since they heard.
Nobody knows where the populatory came from there, just like
(01:00:00):
all of a sudden they're popular. It's just it's strange.
Speaker 1 (01:00:04):
Yeah, there's no rhyme or reason of this ship is there.
Speaker 2 (01:00:07):
Oh god, No, that's the other thing I don't understand anymore.
I don't know. I don't have the stock for it. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:00:16):
You hear some of these bands, You're like, this is
one of the best bands I've ever heard, and they're
playing some shitty bar in Fargo, North Dakota. Yeah, you
see what's selling, and you're like, why, why does anyone
care about this?
Speaker 2 (01:00:27):
But I haven't figured out what it'll take, like yank
me out of retirement yet they're sabbatical. It's not retirement.
It's like you have Gary Louris has asked me to
help them with stuff and Super drunk a couple of times,
and I'm just like, I'm kind of busy, studio is
not set up yet. You know.
Speaker 1 (01:00:46):
It's like, well, it's those were good people to have
to turn down, you.
Speaker 2 (01:00:53):
Know, Yeah, and I didn't. That's the other thing that's
like that's been beneficial, just they're kind of pulling back
from it. It's like actually learning to say no. And
then unfortunately I got really I got a little too
good at this. But I mean I know it's like
I probably will end up like at some point I
would love to mix something for Brad it's like I
was tempted by this future birds thing. It's like, well,
(01:01:13):
we're looking for a mixer. I'm like, not ready yet.
I got it. I gotta get my ears back in order.
And that's the other thing. My aging ears just can't
take a lot of That's another reason I have retreated electronic
things like I can listen to that for a lot
longer than really like bashed out ride cymbals and square
wave distorted guitars. I mean that destroys my like, it
throws me off after an hour listening to that stuff.
Speaker 1 (01:01:36):
Now what so speaking to that, So, what kinds of
stuff are you listening to? What musically bands or groups
that you're into.
Speaker 2 (01:01:43):
No, it's mostly just electronic producers from like Stockholm and
Berlin and Bristol and some of the Bushwick stuff like yeah,
just like young fledgling DJ producer people. It's like, yeah,
techno ish, yeah, uh, it's just so mean. I always
(01:02:04):
had a bent for synthesizers since you know, devo and
craft work in the seventies and a lot of it
that a lot of them. Me getting into that was
driven by we uh Mogfest being hosted here in Durham
for a number of years, so I was exposed to
all kinds of stuff through that. And my partner Sarah
is a DJ, and uh she's mostly DJ's eighty stuff
(01:02:26):
and whatnot. But it's like, all of a sudden, it's
like I kind of saw the synergy between this electronic
stuff and like I was like, oh wait, it's like
there's a direct line from what I'm doing over here
to her CDJs right here on this on this desk.
And I started made that connection. I'm like, well, hang on,
this is I'm kind of into this, you know. It's
like it's like just stepping up to like the c
DJs and like you can manipulate record like it's just
(01:02:49):
and when when we first got to hold one of those,
I was like, oh my god. If I was seventeen,
I would be making a record on these freaking things.
You know, like they've got a mic input on it.
You can It's like who needs samplers, It's all right
here to steal it.
Speaker 1 (01:03:02):
Do you do you have a keyboard? Do you?
Speaker 2 (01:03:04):
That's still the other thing. It's like I I quit
interfacing like my synthesizer stuff with keyboards because it's like
it's like I'm here's here's the cord I play this one. Yeah, yeah,
I know that one your black keys, so you can
do it on the white keys with these three fingers,
and so it's like all the same. So I really
got into just sort of sequencers and Euclidean sequencers and
(01:03:29):
program I mean, I never never thought I'd be into programming.
Used to drive me nuts when I was a guitar players.
It was just wasn't immediate enough. But I think through
years of being a mix engineer that really changed. How
I mean, it's like, wait, when I'm a mixing. When
I'm mixing, I'm just moving around chunks of sound and
making them fit together, carving out space, nudging things here
(01:03:50):
and there, you know. And it's like then all of
a sudden that that that I realized. It's like, wait,
this isn't there's not much difference between what I was
doing there with with like human elements whatever, Like now
I'm just like coaxing AI and machines instead.
Speaker 1 (01:04:04):
Yeah, here's moving music, different instruments.
Speaker 2 (01:04:07):
So yeah, and it's like when it's got so much more,
you have so much more control over just like the
the depth and decay of things than you do, like
with I'm not really, but it's just different. And the
weird thing is, it's like you have to animate it.
It's like you're you're trying to like hone in your
musicians with this stuff. Is like make it like you're
(01:04:29):
trying to coax it to life. You're trying to add
humanity to it instead of subtract humanity from it.
Speaker 1 (01:04:34):
Yeah, a little less humanity.
Speaker 2 (01:04:36):
J Yeah, yeah, well calm down, but not too much.
Speaker 1 (01:04:43):
You know.
Speaker 2 (01:04:43):
It's it's it's really it's taken me years to kind
fully appreciate what a different headspace it is. Like I said,
it's like now, it's just it's sort of a calming tool.
It's it's like it's it's yoga. It's like doing yoga
or going out golfing or something. You know, it's or cooking,
cooking and like just doodling, sound goodling And really, if
(01:05:04):
I have any anxiety whatsoever, which I'm.
Speaker 1 (01:05:07):
Prone to eno fan, I suppose a fan of.
Speaker 2 (01:05:10):
His early work, not a fan of the person so much.
I don't ever want to hear him speak. It's just
like it makes it's I'm like, sh no, you're not.
It's like wow, looking at he's like sitting out in
front of the logic. It's like, isn't this just amazing?
I mean, look what I can do. I'm like, yeah,
any Brian, everybody does that now, you know. It's like, sorry, dude,
(01:05:32):
you know, it's like, but yeah, I really appreciate his
he was pioneering in his work, the early stuff. But yeah,
and he still does cool stuff occasionally. You know. It's
like Fred again an emo record, What's wrong with me?
What's happening? It's likely O, guess what. I don't care
about being cool anymore. I can listen to whatever I want.
It's great.
Speaker 1 (01:05:50):
My friend Bred bran if I was talking about earlier
with the Bebo Bebop Docks. He's a big EEno head,
Like I think you two would be pals. He got
very similar taste to me is but he was away was.
He's quite a bit older than me, and he's always
been telling me you know, you know, you know, and
never did anything like in the last five or six years. Now,
I'm like, oh, I like to see no thing. I'm like,
it's it's funny. How was life changes and you get older,
(01:06:14):
sometimes things finally hit you. And I was kind of
been there, so.
Speaker 2 (01:06:18):
Yeah, No. It's funny. It's like I had all those
like all those seventies records all along, but it's like
nothing that I really I didn't. I didn't really dig
into him, you know. But when it's like you can't
avoid him, it's like people people will stare you down
that path, you know. It's it's almost like this, like Dylan,
I'm like, yeah, no shit, Dylan, Yeah, wow, yeah, yeah,
(01:06:41):
what It's like, what did I miss? Yeah, He's still
the greatest songwriter ever apparently, and it's like, yeah, listen
to it. I don't need to listen to it Dylan.
Speaker 1 (01:06:50):
But Dylan is another one of those that, yeah, for years,
I'm like, eh, I don't get it, and then one
day I did get it, but it took forever.
Speaker 2 (01:06:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:07:00):
The same thing to me, honestly, Like you know, London
Calling was I was every top album list of all time,
and I'm like, of course, the greatest album cover of
all time in my opinion, it's amazing.
Speaker 2 (01:07:10):
But the most embarrassing and sad thing for me with
the Clash was it's like I love the Clash, Yeah,
And I realized at some point I was like, you
know what, over the last thirty years, I've listened to
a lot more Fleetwood Mac Tusk than I've listened to
London Calling. And I'm afraid to admit not afraid to
admit it anymore.
Speaker 1 (01:07:26):
Well, Fleetwood Mac was another one. Growing up, I wasn't
into Fleetwood Mac. Now I love it.
Speaker 2 (01:07:31):
Uh, Lindsey Buckingham fan, I'm a huge fan.
Speaker 1 (01:07:34):
Oh my god, this is funny. I was walking down
the street in New York City and what year this
must have been, probably twenty eighteen or twenty nineteen, probably eighteen,
I think, And I see all these people on the
street and they're screaming and big ruckus, and I'm like,
what are they protesting? Is you know it's twenty eighteen.
(01:07:55):
We got to be protesting something. And then all of
a sudden, I'm like, oh, they're Lindsay Buckingham walking into
that building. I thought they were having some political No,
they were just excited to see Lindsay bucking and walking
into a building.
Speaker 2 (01:08:11):
I was so bummed. He was supposed to play here
a couple of years ago, but he got sick. Oh yeah,
Like I think it's the second time he's canceled a
tour here. It's like the lead up but yeah, and
that was right before Christine to Bee died, so I
was like some tide to that, but he apparently didn't know.
Speaker 1 (01:08:27):
So yeah, she was. She was there with him in
New York, I guess because they were going in to
do an interview in some building when they did that
kind of duo duo album.
Speaker 2 (01:08:35):
But yeah, that even some of those recent solo albums
are good. I was like, Elliott Smith, whatever, listen to this?
Speaker 1 (01:08:46):
That guy. I don't know how when people say the
best guitar players, he isn't up there at the top usually. Yeah,
you know, the big Page Hendricks and it's a different style,
but it's it's insane, like speaking being.
Speaker 2 (01:09:00):
Beat over the head with something like Dylan. I mean,
I think it's probably just like the people have been
so beating over the head with Fleetwood Mac. You know,
it's like that they're lumped in with the Eagles. It's
just they're like, you know, don't ever want to hear
that again or even consider it.
Speaker 1 (01:09:11):
And I get that, Yeah, you ever make it up
to Minneapolis these days or you pretty much?
Speaker 2 (01:09:17):
I was just up there last last week. I snuck
up for the Arc Welder shows.
Speaker 1 (01:09:21):
Oh you were up here?
Speaker 2 (01:09:22):
For that.
Speaker 1 (01:09:23):
That's cool. How are they?
Speaker 2 (01:09:24):
No, I didn't tell anybody was coming except Tony Pooky
was the only one that knew. I just showed up.
It was it was great, it was Bill was Gravery
was shocked, which was which was my intention.
Speaker 1 (01:09:37):
Where were where were those out? Is that the turf?
Speaker 2 (01:09:40):
Was that the Turf Club? But it's like, yeah, it's
one of those things that's I just felt the need.
It's like I need to do this. I mean, who
knows how much longer there is to do something like this,
and I really need to let people that mean something
to me know that I actually care, you know, still
like even though it's like the serial tribal tribalist is
has gone are down the road, there's still people I
(01:10:01):
care about. But no Graver is like that. I could
have talked to him for days because we've got a
lot of catching up to do.
Speaker 1 (01:10:11):
It's awesome. Did you get a copy of jefs Person's book.
Speaker 2 (01:10:14):
I haven't yet. A lot of people are talking about it. It
sounds like it's good.
Speaker 1 (01:10:18):
It's super good. I think I read that thinging about
a day. It was just a lot of fun.
Speaker 3 (01:10:22):
Ye.
Speaker 1 (01:10:23):
His love of music just comes out and is writing.
Speaker 2 (01:10:26):
My God, it's yeah. I was running into him in
Athens George occasionally, and it's just like just kind of
stunned by it. It's just like he's still like it's
like a kid in the candy store with it's still
at his age. I'm just like, wow, I lost that
so long ago. Actually I got it back now with
like the like diving down all these like DJ and
(01:10:49):
electronic music scenes all across the world. It's like it's
it's it's the thrill is still there. It's just it's yeah,
you just it just takes work, that's all. You don't
need somebody to tell you what to do, like to
find it's like or somebody could. It's nice to have
somebody to kind of steer you in a direction. But
it's like that's the thing I appreciate about. It's like
I'm finding things I like because I just like it,
(01:11:12):
not because somebody that's like it's a part of a
it's not Condon Nast slash Pitchfork telling me this is
what I should be listening to. It's like it's it's
nice to be able to find your own path now,
and it's it's actually really doable if you take the
time to do it.
Speaker 1 (01:11:25):
And you don't have to wait for those records to
show up from the end.
Speaker 2 (01:11:27):
No, no, no, I don't need And that's I'm not
one of those people that is like sad about like
physical media disappearing. It's like, I love being able to
like travel around with this thing and hook it up
to my car and just like it's all there. You know.
I love that.
Speaker 1 (01:11:43):
I love having both options as you Yeah, yeah, no,
I mean there's something you love how quickly you can
just pull something up on your phone.
Speaker 2 (01:11:51):
Yeah, it's Sarah uh DJ's vinyl. And she's just like
I just got her into like the c DJ thing,
just like a and a half ago, and she's got
a bad back so.
Speaker 1 (01:12:05):
To carry around Oh god.
Speaker 2 (01:12:07):
Yeah, no, I was the one that had to do that.
But then she realizes, like when she's like walked out
the door with a USB stick and that's all she
had to bring in some headphones, she was like, Ooh,
I could get used to this. And now she's getting
into the flexibility of it, and she's getting really good
at just like the instant like mixed like total crazy mixes.
And now it's like it's hard for her to go back.
(01:12:28):
It's like it's like to pull out all the vinyl
and I have to carry it and it's so slow
because then you have to like put the record on
and it's like it's just too slow. The book element
of it, that's the part I miss. And that's also
when my career went down the tubes, is when nobody
like when CDs, people could buy CDs and my free
(01:12:49):
advertising gone.
Speaker 1 (01:12:52):
So looking back to wrap up here and let you
get back to your to your Saturday night. I've got
a tweeen ager sleepover happening over at my house right now.
Speaker 2 (01:13:02):
So exciting out there.
Speaker 1 (01:13:04):
Well, I wish me luck. I'm gonna go hide and
watch the Timberwolves. But you know, looking at your career
as a whole, you know, is there an album that
you're you're most proud of that you were a part off.
Speaker 2 (01:13:17):
There's a number of them. The Willgune Sunwold come to mind.
I mean that that was like kind of the pinnacle.
That was like, uh, that was the peak of the fun.
Speaker 1 (01:13:27):
Those are so cord.
Speaker 2 (01:13:30):
But it leading up to that, it's like, Uh, the
Arcwady Records are crucial in my development. Whole I thought
was executed very well, even though it's like we demoed
the ship out of it, and that's one of those
worst situations where we demoed this into it and it
actually benefited us. Uh slind Spiderland. Of course that I
(01:13:50):
owe everything to that record. I mean that that's when
things just went bananas for me. It was just like
one of those moments Unrest, Perfect Teeth, super Chunk, foolish
m I adore those people as a band and as friends.
It' they mean so much to me. God, I'm gonna
(01:14:14):
get scared. I don't know, I'm pretty It's like the
polo records were great, particularly like the the in Prism record,
Like Ash and I really be that one. We we
went a little tracy at the hid Sight. It was
worth it, even though it bumps some people out because
it wasn't like like you said, with the Archers Loaf,
It's like this is a Nurtre's record. It's like that
(01:14:35):
wasn't really a polo record either, but yeah, it was
an Ash Bowie extravaganza.
Speaker 1 (01:14:40):
Well yeah, that's how you keep going, really like if
you keep it's I love the Ramones, but how many
Ramones records you need? You know?
Speaker 2 (01:14:49):
Right? Yeah? How did they do that? You know, it's
like we'll get Phil Spector it'll be really different still,
So yeah, I mean it's I was. I was so
fortunate to be handed so many amazing things, like yeah,
even working with Dinosaur Junior. I mean it's yeah, there's
(01:15:09):
endless I know, I'm forgetting a million things because there's
just so many things to keep up with. But I
think I touched the ones that are like really sent
me on a path, and that's that was really important
to me.
Speaker 1 (01:15:20):
Well, Dinosaur Junior was probably the end of your ears.
Speaker 2 (01:15:24):
Yeah right, oh my god. Yeah, back, I didn't write
your plugs back then either, amazingly enough.
Speaker 1 (01:15:30):
Well, I appreciate you coming on and chat and it's funny.
Speaker 2 (01:15:33):
Yeah we could forever, but plenty of editing ahead of you.
Speaker 1 (01:15:37):
No, it's good stuff, and thanks for your work on
those records. Like a lot of the stuff that you
mentioned are literally right behind me. So I appreciate you
talking with me about.
Speaker 2 (01:15:46):
That and Babs of tailand too.
Speaker 1 (01:15:49):
Oh my bad Lorian too. Like I said, I.
Speaker 2 (01:15:53):
Guess I'm going to forget and I want to have
extreme guilt once we get off this call.
Speaker 1 (01:15:58):
But this is just just got to end it with
I've enjoyed every moment working on the wedding present I
worked with was the best.
Speaker 2 (01:16:10):
It was the best. There was a friend of mine
to New York that got so sick of me in
nineteen ninety three because like, after your unrest, it would
be like, I've just done the best record I've ever done,
and then months later, oh, this Joe Henry records the
best record ever done. This Uncle Tublaw record is the
best record I've ever do, And she's like, every record
you've done is the best record you've ever done. Shut up. Well,
I mean at the time it was that year was
(01:16:32):
so crazy. It's like I couldn't believe the phone calls
I was getting. I was just like, what the hell
is happening? This is a dream. It was good. That
was fun. It was fun for a while. I'm a
very fortunate person.
Speaker 1 (01:16:51):
Ryan Paulson look at that. What a great guy, really
amazing career in producing and engineering literally some of the
some of my favorite records he was involved, so really
fun to chat with him. Thank him for being on
the show, Thank you for listening. We've got some upcoming
(01:17:12):
shows from the High End Stress Frontier. I guess I've
got a duo show with its bass player Jim, doing
an acoustics show next month. March looks like March ninth
at Black Lung in the Chicago area, and we'll be
seeing my pals Billy Pilgrim the next night playing in Ottawa, Illinois.
(01:17:36):
To make sure you pick up your tickets to that
see Christian and Andrew do their thing, and that's gonna
be an amazing show as it always is. And listen
back to that episode I had with them from a
couple of years ago. It's great to have them back
and playing again. So if you're in the Illinois area,
make sure you go see Billy Pilgrim. And also there'll
be some upcoming high end stress full band shows starting
(01:17:58):
in April. We're about to hit the studio one again,
work on the follow up to Hold Me In and
as soon as we can get back in the studio.
So thanks again for listening. We will see you for
the next episode of the figure Ates podcast and have
a lovely day.
Speaker 4 (01:18:26):
Workin saxes, loads and loads of faxes, rock and roll, Dreamer, dreams, Loyalty, Fame,
send sympathetically, traffic lights, deep Tide, Did you call Sue
expected the dark comedy of love and life A year
(01:18:52):
in Review.
Speaker 2 (01:18:58):
Who's on the men.
Speaker 5 (01:19:03):
For a broken part? Don't stop for the meaning the life.
Don't stop for meaning.
Speaker 4 (01:19:15):
The lie.
Speaker 1 (01:19:21):
Knock can't.
Speaker 2 (01:19:24):
The things that I have ansome me.
Speaker 3 (01:19:29):
Don't stop for the meaning.
Speaker 2 (01:19:31):
The lie.
Speaker 1 (01:19:36):
Knock can't the things that I have the minsome me.
Speaker 3 (01:19:45):
Don't stop for the meaning a lie. Don't stop for
the meaning the lie. Don't stop for the meeting. Don't
stop for the meeting the lie.
Speaker 2 (01:20:03):
S S S S S storing sub spell says
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