Download: VOICEsVOICEs “Flulyk Visions” (Radio Edit)

(from the Origins EP out Feb. 2 on Manimal)

VOICEsVOICEs might be like the middle of every great Led Zeppelin song, or maybe like Yoko Ono played backwards while in a warm cave. Their new EP—produced by Prefuse 73—is out now on Manimal Vinyl. Nico Turner and Jenean Farris met with L.A. RECORD‘s Scott Schultz at the Farmers Market to discuss how Prefuse brought out the voices of VOICEsVOICEs, which of them is the better wrestler, and how drummers are more than the musicians at the back of the stage.

I was listening to an advance track of one of the songs on your new EP, and I could actually make out a couple of the lyrics clearly: ‘Human kindness.’
Jenean Farris (drums/vocals/effects): That was from ‘Flulyk Visions,’ from our EP coming out in January. It’s pronounced ‘flu-like,’ like ‘flu-like symptoms.’ When we make soundscapes, it’s all about how it feels. And we’re obsessed with the English language—the way words sound together. We try to be spontaneous about how we name our songs—it’s how we’re feeling. Whatever name pops in our head right away that just fits, we’ll run with it. And for whatever reason, that popped into my head for that song.
You were both new to your instruments when you started VOICEsVOICEs, right?
Nico Turner (guitar/vocals/effects): We were both drummers in other bands. We played around, but we didn’t actually know what we were doing. Pedals, amps, guitars—we didn’t really know how it worked.
Jenean Farris: We could strum a guitar, but until you plug it in and hook it up, you really don’t know what you’re doing.
Nico Turner: We had guitars, but we didn’t want them to sound like guitars because that was boring to us. So we started experimenting and really didn’t know what we were doing.
Jenean Farris: In the beginning, it was more about the sounds we could capture. And then we had the one loop pedal, so we would loop stuff—a lot of it was vocals going through the guitar mix and distorting the vocals to make sounds as well.
How did Nico end up the guitarist? Did you flip a coin?
Nico Turner: When we would jam and play together to come up with stuff, it just happened that I enjoyed a lot of the stuff that I was coming up with—these sounds on guitar—and Jenean is such an amazing drummer and it just happened that she was into that so much. She’s just so good at it, so it happened.
Which one of you is the better singer?
Jenean Farris: We have the same singing individual ability. We have different styles so it works out to be equal. Our name, VOICEsVOICEs, is a lot of masking. We wanted to get more harmonies out there and actually really get our voices out there—it’s like we got the drumming and the sounds were fine, but our own natural voices were frightening—and then to write lyrics and stuff … We’re the hardest critics on ourselves. So when we went to record with Prefuse 73, the first thing he did was stick us in front of a microphone and was like, ‘OK, sing this part!’ Put us on the spot and it forced us to do it. And it was cool because we wouldn’t have been able to do it unless he was the way he was—which was very, ‘DAMN! That’s dope!’ He was really supportive and telling Nico things that she never even knew about her voice before—with me too. That’s really interesting and I wouldn’t have ever thought of it that way until he mentioned it to me. It was really encouraging. That helped us get to that place where we’re not afraid now to really actually sing—even without effects and stuff.
Were you nervous about working with Prefuse?
Nico Turner: Like Jenean said, he actually yanked me in front of the microphone to sing my first day. It literally took me all day to get my voice out of my body. He was so nice and patient and willing to work with us and really defused the whole ‘Oh my god, it’s Prefuse 73!’ thing. It was great and he was one of the best people to work with.
On that first day when Nico was on the mic, were you behind the glass with Prefuse? What was running through your head?
Jenean Farris: I was excited. I know I don’t have the most immaculate voice, but I’m not afraid to go out there and try. I was excited because he was forcing her to do it, but he was able to be more encouraging than I am able to be. His way is way more gentle and supportive in ways I can’t be.
What kind of fingerprints did Prefuse leave on you?
Jenean Farris: He took us in a direction that we wanted to go but we didn’t have the capabilities. We went in there with live technology.
Nico Turner: He was somebody who knew how to mix well and was a great producer who let us draw the line without any big ego about it, and he only worked with us because he wanted to work with us. We were spoiled working with him. He pushed us vocally and with electronics and stuff that we wanted to lean toward—experiments that we weren’t previously capable of.
Jenean Farris: He also has all this really fun equipment that we don’t have. Like he let me put some lap steel in there just to add a little texture! Not a solo, but to make different sounds.
When you first started writing together, did you intentionally avoid making traditional songs?
Jenean Farris: It wasn’t a deliberate counter-approach. We weren’t like, ‘Oh, we’re going to be different!’ We wanted to embrace the sounds. Whatever we did, if it was something we liked, we were going to try to be free and run with it.
Nico Turner: It was an experiment about embracing the creation of sound. Whatever we liked was what we ran with.
Jenean Farris: We have a library of small loops that we’ve come up with. We recycle a lot of things. We’ll go back to a loop that we liked and build off of it. Some rock bands would say that we just use riffs. It’s kind of like that. We find noises that we like and build off of it.
Was the Sounds Outside EP recorded live?
Jenean Farris: It wasn’t recorded live. It was recorded at a gallery, but it was kind of live.
Nico Turner: It wasn’t one take. It was recorded in three takes. We did the whole CD in one day. The track ‘Sounds Outside’ was recorded with one take.
Jenean Farris: We sat on the floor and recorded it live—no retake.
Nico Turner: At the Show Cave in Echo Park.
Jenean Farris: That was where I first heard the Rainbow Arabia CD. I borrowed it and never gave it back.
I always say Manimal bands travel in packs. The first time I saw you at the Echo, it was after being highly recommended by Devon from Exit Music and Eddie from Polyamorous Affair. Eddie said, ‘VOICEsVOICEs sounds like the middle of every great Zeppelin song.’ How do you describe it?
Jenean Farris: People always ask us and I just say, ‘I don’t know, man!’
Nico Turner: I just say ‘experimental,’ even though that is totally vague. But that’s what we are. It’s a big experiment for us.
Jenean Farris: People want you to classify yourself, but the second you do that, there is so many things they can write off about you. We’re really worried because some people say electronic, some people say ambient, psychedelic, rock … We’re really parts of all of them. We just try to stay away from a band sound. We’ll let other people make those statements.
You two have been together less than a year and a half. Are you surprised how much progress you’ve made?
Nico Turner: We never had a plan—we wanted to create something different without being stuck behind a drum kit.
Jenean Farris: We don’t want to be a drum machine for someone else’s band—like a robot. We wanted to get the respect as artists and songwriters.
Nico Turner: We wanted to break that mold of our only being drummers—
Jenean Farris: —and not being credited as songwriters or having any creative input.
Nico Turner: Just because we liked what were doing and it was so special to us—that was the drive for us to go out and play as many shows as we could in the first year. Then we met Chuck P [from Indie 103.1]. We were so proud of our EP—we said, ‘Chuck, you love music, check this out!’ We just gave it to him and he loved it, and he knew Paul from Manimal. It was really just being proud of what we were doing and wanting to share it, and everything just came from there.
Jenean Farris: In terms of things happening to us as a baby band, it’s really serendipitous. Everything is falling into place. I mean, we do have to give ourselves some credit, too—after all, we have been working really hard. Right from the beginning, we were out promoting and putting ourselves out there as much as possible, even when we weren’t even ready. We would play shows before we even had our set down, and it was actually a very vulnerable place to be in. People could see us learning how to play right in front of them—a very, raw vulnerable place to be. But that was part of the excitement. And of course we would do that in places where that was OK. We wouldn’t go play at the Viper Room. People go there expecting performances and they expect them to be tight. The art galleries, the Smell—places like that—we could put ourselves out there and it was fine, and then it just happened that Paul saw one of our notices out there online—it may have even been L.A. RECORD. Serendipity and the total effort of working hard.
Was there a ‘Eureka!’ moment when you realized that you two had something? That it wasn’t just a personal project?
Nico Turner: I remember my ‘Eureka!’ moment. We were practicing at the Smell—it was just us there. It was hot, and we felt like we were wasting time and were ready to give up. Jenean went outside to smoke a cigarette and I stayed inside and to get out my aggression I started playing the second part of ‘Tape Moon’ and yelling that part, and Jenean came running in and said, ‘Keep doing that!’ And we wrote the song. It was June 2008 when we were first practicing. It was one of our first practices. We were trying to write songs for our show we had with Mick Turner.
From Hawkwind?
Jenean Farris: No. From the Dirty Three. If it was Nik Turner from Hawkwind, my mom would have shit bricks. She loves them. One of the first records I ever had was Fripp and Eno where it was one long song. My parents were punk rock musicians, though. Nico’s dad was a jazz player.
And you two met at a Xu Xu Fang show?
Jenean Farris: We did meet at a Xu Xu Fang show. We had talked about meeting up at a show at some point. I had just discovered Xu Xu Fang, and I loved them and I saw that they were playing at Silverlake Lounge. So I called her and said, ‘You have to check out this band.’ So she went and she loved it and it was awesome—so that was cool. And it was really weird that night because there were thunderstorms. It started to leak in and the power went out, but they still managed to do some sort of a drum-off with minimal light in the background and funky pictures. It was all very moody because they had to play without power. From there, we started talking about having a project together.
If you were to ever cover a song with clear vocals, what would it be?
Nico Turner: We want to cover Laurie Anderson really bad. We would do a cover medley and make one big song out of it.
Jenean Farris: We just got this new sampler that will make it awesome. When we get back from our tour we are going to learn that thing. No work—just play music.
Nico Turner: We want to figure out how to imitate Laurie’s vocoder sound but without a vocoder. We’ll borrow howardAmb’s—howardAmb is this band who loves Laurie Anderson also. They’re a two-person band and they use a vocoder.
Jenean Farris: We saw a band the other night—Jogger—at Mr. T’s Bowl, and they did a Laurie Anderson cover, and I was like, ‘YEAH!’ They did ‘O, Superman.’ It was genius because you have to be creative with the electric violin, and he was singing through his violin and it gave a vocoder effect.
Jenean Farris: I think we’ll meet Laurie Anderson soon because I believe in the power of positive thinking. Read The Secret!
Who wins when you two wrestle?
Nico Turner: Jenean is pretty aggressive when she drinks, so she usually starts it, and she’s pretty good so she usually wins. I’m getting better though, unless she catches me off guard.
Jenean Farris: I tried to wrestle Quinn [from Corridor] when he was playing drums with us on the road. We were in Seattle. I think that’s why he decided he didn’t want to join our band.
Nico Turner: Quinn is in great shape. He must have wrestled in high school or something. He took her out in nothing flat. He’s also an amazing drummer.
What are your spirit animals?
Jenean Farris: I am a tiger and Nico is a crow. It’s funny that you asked that, because the cover of our new 7” is a merging of our two spiritual animals. It’s a tiger with a crow flying through it.
Nico Turner: I think I’m actually more of a house cat.
Jenean Farris: No, you are definitely a crow!

VOICEsVOICEs WITH PREFUSE 73 AND GASLAMP KILLER ON WED., FEB. 3, AT THE TROUBADOUR, 9081 SANTA MONICA BLVD., WEST HOLLYWOOD. 8 PM / $15-$17 / ALL AGES.
TROUBADOUR.COM. VOICEsVOICEs’ ORIGINS EP IS OUT NOW ON MANIMAL VINYL AND VOICEsVOICEs “ANIMAL BATTLE VOL. 1″ 7″ IS OUT NOW ON HOW TO FIGHT RECORDS. VISIT VOICEsVOICEs AT WEAREVOICESVOICES.COM OR MYSPACE.COM/WEAREVOICESVOICES.

Stream: Luis and the Wildfires “Wild In The Head”

(from Brain Jail available now from Wild and Norton)

Luis & the Wildfires make records between egg crates and a tacked-up Charlie Feathers LP in a tiny backyard shed in Altadena where the spirit of the Sonics, Eddie Cochran, Little Willie G and Gene Vincent observe kindly from the corners. Wild Records started with Reb Kennedy plus Luis and drummer Angel Hernandez ten years ago as the Wild Teens in the Valley and now puts out the most materially honest CDs of the 21st century and 45s that will cost $100 in ten years. The hardiest die-hards of Wild meet after another backyard session for High Life and cookies doled out by Wild owner Reb’s wife and son. This interview by Chris Ziegler.

What did you mean when you said you’ve been mouthbreathing for 31 years?
Luis Arriaga (vocals/guitar): They make fun of me because I have a deviated septum and sleep apnea and I smoke and I drink and I sing—
Reb Kennedy (Wild founder/owner): And he nosebreathes.
And he’s a nightmare on tour?
Angel Hernandez (drums): Yes, he is! The worst!
Luis Arriaga: I still seem to survive it. I should be dead! I’m living on borrowed time!
Reb Kennedy: I always tell him to keep his phone when he’s on stage, and if he has a heart attack to call me, and my first call can be to the record manufacturers. ‘Make another thousand, quick!’
Luis Arriaga: The devil’s been knocking on my door, and Reb’s like, ‘Don’t worry—we got a contract, and you can have him after.’
Reb Kennedy: We did a show in Vegas last year and our stage was outside on a rooftop, and Luis jumped up on this balcony with a bar—he had his arms out doing the crucifix pose and the whole audience just went quiet. The drop was a couple hundred feet.
Luis Arriaga: Fifty-five stories up!
Reb Kennedy: ‘Fall! Fall! Fall!’
Luis Arriaga: With the manufacturers on speed dial. ‘Fall! Fall! I need another thousand copies of Brain Jail!’
Why don’t you fake your death?
Luis Arriaga: I die every day I wake up. I’m only alive when I’m sleeping.
How do you wake up in the morning?
Luis Arriaga: I’m angry at the world for the fact my eyes are open again!
What do you dream about?
Luis Arriaga: That I’m skiing! But only because I had four guys in my bed. ‘Swinging my skis and the snow was melting …’ And all the guys in the bed woke up—‘This is the best bed ever! The best rest I ever had!’ Don’t print that—my mom’s gonna read this!
What are your nightmares about?
Luis Arriaga: They’re never really nightmares. My nightmare is waking up.
Does this have anything to do with the line in ‘I’m a Man’ about living in a badger cave?
Luis Arriaga: ‘Panther cave.’ Do they really live in caves? It makes no sense. Proof of my life.
I know you got into rock ‘n’ roll when you were 16, so what were you into when you were 15?
Luis Arriaga: Before I saw the light? There are two answers—you want the real one or the other one? The honest one—I know it sounds extremely goddamn cliché, but I grew up in the San Fernando Valley. North Hollywood. There’s a theater there—El Portal. My dad took me there to see La Bamba. I was like 7 years old whenever that movie came out—I saw the movie and had no concept of what rock ‘n’ roll music was and I absolutely goddamned loved it. I told my dad I wanted a guitar, and my dad went to buy drugs in Tijuana—prescription drugs because they’re legal—and he brought me back a guitar. I attempted to learn it, but I put it down because everyone was evolving into different things, but I’d still come home and attempt to strum ‘La Bamba.’ Oldies things, as I knew them. Growing up I got into everything—grunge, hip-hop, everything. Not until 16 did I pick it up again and I’d watch other people play on TV. I learned one chord and then a second chord—
Reb Kennedy: And then he stopped!
Luis Arriaga: Only two chords since 16! I went back once I learned those two chords—went back to remembering those songs, and once I learned those songs, I was the only guy around what I remember in the Valley … the change came from one day to the next! I don’t know what was in my mind. I attempted to comb my hair into a pompadour! From there, I learned more music and met people—and I met him. We were really young. He’s my brother.
Reb Kennedy: Angel is the only constant in Luis’ bands.
Luis Arriaga: See those wrinkles? See that gray hair? He’s still 17!
What’s the most delinquency you’ve committed within view of a police car?
Luis Arriaga: My parole officer might see this! When we started the Wild Teens, a lot of us were teenagers. Growing up the way we grew up, we did stupid things!
Reb Kennedy: The most obvious—walk out of a club, fall down, stand up, get in the car and drive away!
In what ways would you be a good role model?
Luis Arriaga: You’re asking the most ridiculous questions!
Reb Kennedy: Luis and Angel won’t answer that! It’d be immodest! One thing that’s interesting—I’m Irish, and obviously people find it very bizarre that all my friends are Mexican on my label. We’re called ‘Mexican Rock ‘n’ Roll’ but I’m not!
Luis Arriaga: People in Europe think he’s Mexican.
Reb Kennedy: It’s the blue eyes!
So you’ve seen The Commitments?
Reb Kennedy: I know the guys very well! What you see in The Commitments is what you see any Saturday night at any Mexican party. It’s a very dignified thing, the love of music. I grew up from the age of whatever—being in bars with my family, being in bars singing!
Luis Arriaga: It’s that Catholic background.
What happens when you combine Catholicism with rock ‘n’ roll?
Luis Arriaga: X-ray vision!
Reb Kennedy: Hatred! But I do wanna answer that question. One of the most important things we’ve achieved as a label is that young Mexican individuals in California don’t have much to look to musically. They have Ritchie Valens—
Thee Midniters?
Luis Arriaga: But they don’t look beyond certain things.
Reb Kennedy: There’s only a handful of things to look to. Luis and the Wild Teens and Luis & the Wildfires have given a new wave of teenagers something to look to! I tell Luis and Angel and the rest of the guys—it’s a really weird position. It’s very easy now to underappreciate what you’ve achieved because it’s now! But it will be looked back on as something significant. They are NOW role models for people—for Mexican kids who have nothing to look to.
Luis Arriaga: The young guys on the label started covering songs him and I did ten years ago. I heard and I went home and cried. And masturbated.
Angel Hernandez: Into a taco.
That’s a Saturday night.
Luis Arriaga: A fantastic Saturday night! Watching ‘Sábado Gigante’! Put in the fact I said ‘Sabado Gee-HAN-tay.’ Mexican!
How did the Wild Teens set the direction for Wild? They were the first band.
Luis Arriaga: We sucked! We truly did suck!
Reb Kennedy: They did! We just remastered the Wild Teens record a week ago—we really wanted something in existence to show the band was a good rock ‘n’ roll band. And back then the band couldn’t play.
Angel Hernandez: Sure could drink, though!
Reb Kennedy: Here’s a picture of the Wild Teens. They used to play my club almost all the time. The people who owned it were really cool people—gave them unlimited alcohol! Top shelf! They complained once because we drank $1,000 worth of alcohol. The owner came to me one night and said, ‘I have a problem. You know we give everyone as much alcohol as they want—but I don’t understand when the Wild Teens play why the bar is littered with bottles that they brought in!’ Free alcohol and they still smuggle it in—I think it gave them a hard-on!
Luis Arriaga: It was either that or guns! Guns, gangs, bandannas, whiskey—
Don’t give away the recipe!
Luis Arriaga: We were just silly boys. Silly boys. That first 45 was in 1999—ten years ago! There should be something in the liners about it being ten years. We revisited old songs that I never wanted to sing ever again. But Reb had the brilliant idea—
Reb Kennedy: I wanted to record something with guys who could now play! That band could not play!
Luis Arriaga: But we looked cool as fuck!
Sam Phillips said if you want a rock ‘n’ roll song, you gotta reach down and pull it out your asshole. Is that how you guys do it?
Reb Kennedy: It is! All ours guys have really big assholes. There’s a lot of stuff stored there!
What are the Wild Christmas parties like?
Angel Hernandez: The last ten years are pretty hazy.
Reb Kennedy: The public parties? They vary in so many ways. We had different places. We were every Friday at my house before my son was born—annihilation sessions. Friday and Saturday and Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday—
Luis Arriaga: Reb was a massive drinker.
Reb Kennedy: I drank for the Olympics. Some of the younger guys don’t see me drink. When my son was born I stopped. Partly because of my son and partly because I wouldn’t be successful if I kept drinking. When we do a Wild showcase in Green Bay or Vegas—right now we have sixteen bands on the label. An Australian band, two English, one Portuguese—I have to get every one of these fuckers on stage and off stage! I used to try and do that drunk and it was a problem! We did a show in Green Bay and had a review in the Metro Times that said we were the new Jesus Christs of music—they said amazing things about us! That day the show lasted what—fourteen hours?
Angel Hernandez: Plus the drinking session!
Reb Kennedy: Absolutely incredible show.
Is this like when everyone on Motown would come spilling out of the same tour bus?
Reb Kennedy: That’s the way it works.
Luis Arriaga: We pride ourselves on being the ‘Wild Records Family.’
Reb Kennedy: That’s corny as shit! Put a ‘TM’ and ‘R’! It’s the most ridiculous corny bullshit but we do function that way. If you were here two hours before, there’d have been another fifteen or twenty people.
Luis Arriaga: All doing handclaps on the record!
Reb Kennedy: It’s how we survive! We are a traditional label. Labels don’t exist like us where my job is to do everything. I try to do it fairly.
Luis Arriaga: It’s underrated sometimes. The guy who sits in back? Nothing would be possible for any of us if it wasn’t for him. He’s not just my boss—as sort of the manager and label owner—he’s one of my best friends. His work is never ever done. Ours is—we come here and we’re done when we leave the studio. He goes back in the house and thinks about what the hell just happened!
Reb Kennedy: And fix it!
Luis Arriaga: Clean up the studio and wake up the next day after five or six hours and make sure his son is at school and his wife is fine and then think, ‘What the hell is gonna happen again?’
Angel Hernandez: He has 47 children, basically!
Luis Arriaga: I want it to be known—it’s ridiculous!
That’s how they ran labels in the ’50s and ’60s—all those tiny family labels putting out soul in Detroit.
Luis Arriaga: We’re a DIY label—if that makes us ’77 punk, good!
Reb Kennedy: We’re not 1956! We’re 1976! That’s where I come from. I worked at Rough Trade in London.
Luis Arriaga: We’re gonna do a Joy Division cover—‘Digital.’
Reb Kennedy: I thought it should be ‘Isolation’!
Luis Arriaga: That would ruin me! But you know what’s cool? I’m already ruined! I can only go up from here! It cannot get worse!
What’s the most you were ever ruined in one night?
Reb Kennedy: He doesn’t remember!
Luis Arriaga: Punched in the head by Omar [Romero] in his own house!
Reb Kennedy: Last week was good—all these naked photos of Luis circulating among us! He was so mad!
Luis Arriaga: The hell with you, Reb! My mom is gonna read this! Don’t print it in Spanish. This isn’t a bilingual paper, is it?
What’s the most you ever had to fight through to finish a song?
Angel Hernandez: Do you mean fighting each other?
Reb Kennedy: What’s amazing is the condition he can be in and still get on stage and take your breath away. I’ve seen him in the most fucked-up state of any human being—he’ll get out and do the business. He’ll hurt before, he’ll hurt doing it, he’ll hurt for days after—he physically will hurt! He has asthma!
Luis Arriaga: I should be dead! Reb will tell the devil when to take me!
Reb Kennedy: I’m keeping him going for a little bit.
How do you cure your hangovers?
Luis Arriaga: I drink every day! I’ve never not had a hangover. My mom is gonna read this! Can I say, ‘Happy birthday, Mom? I love you!’ My parents have never seen me perform but they support that I do. He’s my brother—we were teenagers together—16, 17, from the San Fernando Valley. We’d stay at my mom’s house. We’d come home at 3 or 4 in the morning drunk as fuck—underage! We took the bus home!—and my dad would wake us up at 7 AM to pick oranges or mow the lawn.
With an evil smile?
Luis Arriaga: My family is the most amazing family. They tried to teach us a lesson and also laughed at us. A Mexican traditional family—they know we were gonna get drunk.
Angel Hernandez: After his dad would make us do chores, his mom would be like, ‘I don’t cook on weekends … but you earned it.’
Luis Arriaga: It’s a weird thing—music in my family. I never heard music growing up. At all. It was a very odd thing to play at home. If you were playing music, something was going on in your life, so you’d try not to play it. It was very hidden. If I played music, I was sad or happy and my mom would ask, ‘Why are you sad? Why are you happy?’ So there was no music in our household. I think that’s the opposite of most people in music? So I hid all my music. Or not hid, but I’d listen to it on my own. Headphones, old cassettes, Walkmans and shit. A lot of Brenton Wood. ‘Gimme Little Sign.’
Which you translated for Los Straitjackets?
Luis Arriaga: Yeah, and that’s how I met Cesar Rosas.
Did you tell him about La Bamba?
Luis Arriaga: I didn’t! I should have! What I did do—they put me on the spot and it was so awkward. They gave me the address and one day’s notice—‘Can you come tomorrow?’ I also translated Barbara Lynn—‘You’ll Lose a Good Thing.’ Freddy Fender did it too but I did my own—which I thought was amazing! Which I think I still have? Which Gizzelle should do. So they took me down to the house and asked me to do a few translations and who opens the door but Cesar with the goatee and sunglasses? I’m like, ‘Ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod!’ He has a whole section where it was the studio and lounge area. All the Straitjackets were there and some of the guys from Los Lobos and all over the walls were gold and platinum albums, and then a section where it’s all the guitars from all the albums they ever did! Like he never used them again type of deal! It’s a fucking shrine! I don’t think he did it—his wife did it, maybe? And he had a big long TV set with Grammys all over it, and there was a Grammy on the floor! So for the first time in my life and maybe only I picked up a Grammy and dusted it off—
Angel Hernandez: And put it in your pocket?
Luis Arriaga: And it’s right here on my keychain! The first and only time I ever held a Grammy.
So far.
Luis Arriaga: I’m too old! If I haven’t made it yet, I’m not gonna make it now! My looks are fading as we speak!
Reb Kennedy: There must be some quirk or perversion—women who like guys who look like hound dogs.
Luis Arriaga: People who like licking awkward things?
What’s the one thing you’ll never get tired of writing about?
Luis Arriaga: Everything I do is absolutely based on love. ‘Let’s Party’ was written while I was in love. It’s not necessarily about a corny love story, it’s about drinking and having a goddamn good time! Because I was in love and in a good place. ‘Wild in the Head,’ which is also on Brain Jail, is also love as well. Every song I ever write based on how I felt is because of love. It’s the leading force in anything I do. I’m very emotional—probably more than I wanna admit! More than I should admit. At some points embarrassing to admit. But everything I do is based off of love. I think some of my best friends know. Whenever a song is written—it can be the most minimal lyrics, but there’s a line in there that explains myself. I try to write a hook or a party song but I always try to incorporate me. If I’m happy because I felt that that day or was in that state of life, and if it’s a bad song … ‘Mouth Hug’ is not about blow jobs at all!
Reb Kennedy: You don’t give them! Or do you?
Luis Arriaga: People think that song is about hugging somebody. Really? I’m gonna write a song about a hug! I was receiving a mouth hug? I listened to everything there is about music. When I was a lot younger—when I met Reb I was probably 20 or 21, eleven years ago or twelve—I thought I knew what was happening with music, but I always wanted to experiment. Being around him made me wanna look for other music. He knows absolutely everything there is to know! Because he’s 75 years old! He was in World War I! He’s seen it all!
Reb Kennedy: Square wheels on cars!
Luis Arriaga: The first television set! Amazing! Not that he necessarily taught me, but knowing someone I was around was listening to something else made me wanna listen to something else. Made me say, ‘Why are they doing this? Who influenced them?’ Like Devendra—one of my biggest things at the moment. I don’t wanna follow anybody! I don’t follow anybody! I love every aspect of music—from rockabilly to soul to blues to garage to punk to indie to folk to freak folk. I don’t wanna be somebody else exactly. There are things I wanna do. Since I’m into the Devendra thing, I’d love to do something like that, but I’d never follow him. I do what I do and hope it’s a different direction. I don’t wanna stay dormant in one sound. I think I will die if I did the exact same sound for ten years—I will die! Sometimes I’m nervous to move on but …
Reb Kennedy: What’s really important with Luis and all our acts—everyone as individuals, Angel and Luis, they all like music. They all like music and they all listen to music. But I don’t see a heavy influence by anything out there. We all go to shows all the time. We’re not people who you don’t see out—we pay our money and watch whatever! We did the Rolling Stones song for Norton and did Van Morrison for Norton, but that’s not saying those are necessarily influences. Our guys are influenced by what we are doing as a unit more than the past or present. We’re lucky. Luis writes a lot of material. A lot of acts write a lot. Omar—it’s almost like competition. Not as winner or loser, but the guys try and write very clever things! Luis explaining how he writes songs is a very cool thing. Anybody can write, ‘I fell in love today, my heart was broke tomorrow …’
Angel Hernandez: Can we use that?
Luis Arriaga: It’s a hit!
Reb Kennedy: That’s what they wrote for the last 50 years! You have to listen and find where the emotion is! Even in rockabilly—Omar writes about the heartache he goes through, but he doesn’t write, ‘I fell in love today, fell out of love tomorrow …’
Luis Arriaga: Totally a hit!
Reb Kennedy: The guys are clever—it’s not writing by formula writing.
How does Luis & the Wildfires fit into L.A.? You seem so self-contained.
Reb Kennedy: L.A. has no influence! We could be anywhere in the world.
Luis Arriaga: Michigan! No Mexicans in Michigan. There isn’t—we were there! Rarely any Mexicans.
Angel Hernandez: Even the taco stand didn’t have Mexicans.
Reb Kennedy: People talk about indie music—we ARE independent music. Anyone else is full of shit! We are independent! This is our studio. We are self-sufficient! It’s all material by our own people. We record, mix and master our own material. We manufacture our own sleeves. Nobody influences how we sell or who we sell to. We’re truly independent. So it doesn’t matter where we are. We’re in this garage—we can take that anywhere!
Link Wray actually did that.
Reb Kennedy: It makes no difference we’re in L.A. We are the new wave and a lot of old acts are threatened by the new wave.
Luis Arriaga: We surpassed the people we saw—I know it’s a bold goddamn statement to say but we have surpassed… don’t print that! I don’t wanna get jumped later! They look to us but never wanna admit—the old generation don’t ever wanna let another generation in.
Reb Kennedy: The old guard may read that and say ,‘Fuck off! You can’t play as good as me!’ They missed the point! Luis isn’t saying that structured guitar playing is better—we have true energy, true soul… We’re not jaded! We were out last night absolutely fucked and we just did a ten hour day—
Luis Arriaga: And we’ll have some drinkin’ later on! [And we did.—ed.]
Reb Kennedy: We have that youth you lose as days go past.
Is soul real?
Reb Kennedy: It is!
Luis Arriaga: I signed mine to Reb!
Reb Kennedy: I have them all in bottles! I keep their souls! It keeps me looking young! If people feel they need to label music—we are a rock ‘n’ roll label, but the key word to everything we do is soul. You may not hear it in Brain Jail—if you’re deaf!—but soul doesn’t mean Otis Redding, or it does—soul is putting your heart into what you’re doing. Our guys do that—our guys are here today doing it!
Luis Arriaga: We do what we do—we have soul and heart and we’re all friends and we work hard for each other. It’s a DIY label … and this mustache is itching me.
Reb Kennedy: Give it back to the woman you took it from.
What’s the biggest difference between the crowd at a bar mitzvah and the crowd at the release party for the porno movie you soundtracked?
Luis Arriaga: So many years between! The bar mitzvah was when we were kids—all we had was that 45! That kid found me in Vegas and took me to a burger joint. He remembered me! ‘You played my bar mitzvah!’ ‘Who are you? Who is this awkward drunk?’
Reb Kennedy: Funny thing about the porno—a lot of acts aspire to get movies and soundtracks and we’d like that.
Looking for a Mitsubishi commercial?
Reb Kennedy: We are! I like Cadillacs.
Nick Tosches says rock ‘n’ roll was invented by a lot of guys who wanted Cadillacs.
Reb Kennedy: It’s the truth!
Luis Arriaga: We’ve done other pornos.
Angel Hernandez: Pizza delivery boy number one!
Luis Arriaga: The same guy that did Bad Luck Betties asked me and Angel for a favor, so we played a lot of music on it.
Angel Hernandez: So yeah, we did a porno together.
Luis Arriaga: Don’t print this! My mom is gonna read it! No—if it’s not in Spanish, it’s cool.
Angel Hernandez: ReBelle Rousers.
Luis Arriaga: Look at the credits. Just me and him—we recorded every single instrument. We didn’t know how to play.
Reb Kennedy: Skin flute?
Angel Hernandez: Rusty trombone.
Luis Arriaga: Now this is serious shit. It was nominated for an AVN award for the soundtrack because of us—they started the category for us! And check this shit. Bad Luck Betties—the next one—again in the category we helped start—print this shit! Let me help you type this! Bad Luck Betties was also nominated for ‘Best Soundtrack’ and we lost … to Eddie Van Halen! Not a bad second! He provided one song while Wild Records did a whole soundtrack.
So did you all gather round together and watch your porno proudly?
Luis Arriaga: The circle jerk? What was the question?
Reb Kennedy: The jerk-off competition?
Angel Hernandez: And everybody won!

LUIS & THE WILDFIRES WITH EL VEZ, THE LOVELY ELVETTES AND LOS STRAITJACKETS ON FRI., DEC. 18, AT THE TROUBADOUR, 9081 SANTA MONICA BLVD., WEST HOLLYWOOD. 8 PM / $15-$18 / ALL AGES. TROUBADOUR.COM. LUIS & THE WILDFIRES’ BRAIN JAIL IS AVAILABLE FROM NORTON AND THE “I’M A MAN” 45 IS AVAILABLE FROM WILD RECORDS. VISIT LUIS & THE WILDFIRES AT MYSPACE.COM/THEWILDFIRES OR WILDPRESENTS.COM.

Hurley, purveyors of velcroed boardshorts and other surf fineries, interviewed L.A. Record photographer Dan Monick for their Featured Artist series! You can see the video and read the words here: HURLEY.COM

LA RECORD photographer and co-founder Dan Monick has a photography exhibit running November 7-20 at Grain in LA. From an interview with LittleBird Gallery on the show:

LittleBird Gallery: Commercially, you are known for your portrait work and yet the subject matter in this exhibit focuses on images of everyday objects – often in a state of disorder or decay, and almost always out of context.

Dan Monick: The funny thing about portraits – because I have done portrait shows as well – is that people either identify with the images in a really hardcore way or not at all. So I very intentionally stayed away from portraits in this collection. But I’ve always shot stuff like this – little narrative stories.

Check out what Dan does when he’s not taking photos of musician’s faces at My Love For You Is Immense.

Sat Nov 7th
7-10Pm
At: Grain
3135 Glendale Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90039
Nov 7-Nov 20
By Appointment
info@littlebirdgallery.com

Gallery is located in the back studio

LBGSQUEEKS.BLOGSPOT.COM

Stream: The Happy Hollows “Silver”

(from Spells available now from thehappyhollows.bandcamp.com)

The Happy Hollows self-released their first album Spells in October—satisfying months of local anticipation—and today they begin their month-long residency at Spaceland. Bassist Charles Mahoney speaks now about the new album, his new book on Latin America insurgencies and making friends with French people at CMJ. This interview by Britt Witt.

What is the luckiest thing that ever happened to Happy Hollows?
Charles Mahoney (bass): I think we’re lucky that we have Sarah—she’s the unique person in our band. She’s kooky, quirky, really artistic—the songs come from her and she can write so many different types of songs. She writes folk songs, artsy songs, pop songs—so I think coming from her we just have a lot of music. We can go from the simplest pop music to very artistic and sort of outlawed stuff, and we do both of those at the same time. Its not the style but the structure of ours that’s at polar ends.
Is Sarah the one who’s making the Happy Hollows video skits?
Charles Mahoney: Yeah, Sarah likes comedy a lot—our friend was just going to videotape us on our tour so it just started out as a typical tour documentary but while we were doing it, Sarah turned it into this fake documentary where she was just going crazy. She acted out the part with people while the video is going on—she’s sort of twisted in a way. The other one was just another comedy video where she is a woman from Long Island and one day she was just like ‘Check out this video that I did!’ And I was like ‘Alright—you spent your day doing that?’ So yeah—she has the comedy bones in the band.
So while Sarah is at home making videos, you’re at home studying politics?
Charles Mahoney: I’m basically writing a book about guerrilla organizations in Latin America over the past 50 years—looking at those organizations and comparing how basically different groups came to different ends. So like, how Fidel Castro and the Sandinistas took over the countries they were in whereas the other groups crashed and burned. Also comparing it to the stuff on terrorism that’s really hot now. Not that the groups use terrorism, but they’re all sort of terrorists in that they try to take over countries.
Your focus is Latin America?
Charles Mahoney: It’s more like insurgency, terrorism, guerrilla war—all the theory on that. And then I take that and because I know something about Latin America, I just apply to all the cases there. I wouldn’t say that I’m some Latin America guru or anything! But I speak Spanish and Portuguese so that’s where I try to apply it. I’m working on my Ph.D dissertation. I should be done in the spring. I’m writing chapters now. It’s like a 300 page book, so I go through highs and lows. I’m about a third and a half done. Hopefully I can finish!
What are you most concerned about in the world now?
Charles Mahoney: Latin America doesn’t have much going on right now. Obviously Afghanistan and Pakistan is the major security thing I’m worried about. The question is, ‘Should the U.S send more troops?’ It’s an interesting problem. Really, I think the U.S either has to send 200,000 troops or take everybody out of there. If the U.S took the army out, what are the odds that something would happen? If you just left the aid there and took the troops out, the odds of something happening is like 1 or 2%. You’re think, ‘We’re spending so much money and troops there just to change the probability of an attack on us by like 1%. We should probably just take the troops out and boost the aid where you can.’ Its hard for us politically because that’s where Al Qaeda and the Taliban are, so for a president to try and do that would not be popular domestically. It’s troubling because we could use this money to fund a health care program in the U.S. The money we spend on wars in the Middle East could give us total health care coverage in the U.S.—it’s tricky.
How do your personalities fit together in the music? Your songs seem to have a sort of whimsical pop aspect and then a heavier kind of art thrash aspect.
Charles Mahoney: The whimsical side is sort of our escapist tendencies. We’re just sort of trying to escape the every day sort of hustle-and-bustle grind. Rather than write about our problems, like sappy emo-type stuff or relationships—instead of wallowing in whatever is going on in our lives, we just create these other imaginary places or characters or settings or ideas. That’s sort of our way of escaping reality. Creating an alternate reality is a big theme or purpose of our music. The heavy or thrash part is just like sometimes we like to get loud and move around a little bit, you know? If you see us live, it’s sort of natural. If you’re feelin’ it, move around—if you wanna dance, dance!
How is Spells doing?
Charles Mahoney: I think it’s doing well. We initially had to self-release it. We got signed in the spring and this big label was going to release it but they backed out because of financial issues, so we either had to go around and look for another label—which takes a while—or self-release. It’s gotten a lot of good reviews and college radio play so we’re pretty happy with that. This medium-sized L.A. label called Autumn Tone is going to re-release it again in January. They’re going to give it proper distribution and get it into stores—do a more proper campaign in terms of media. We do the iTunes and all that stuff—Amazon, Emusic. We do a little media campaign like email listeners and then we sell at shows, but its not at any independent record stores or properly distributed.
Are you going to be releasing it as mostly a digital release? But maybe with vinyl?
Charles Mahoney: No, no. We still have CDs—I know a lot of people come to our shows and want physical CDs. We have a 7-inch vinyl of two songs on the album and the digital, of course. But people definitely still request physical compact discs—people do still exist in the physical world so we made CDs and we’re selling those at shows. We did all the artwork ourselves. It was our singer and guitarist Sarah. She got some watercolors together and started splattering them around her room. She came up with 100 or 150 different sheets of watercolor and then she started painting different animals and lines and clouds. She did this theme of clouds that looked like palm trees—you cant tell if it’s a palm tree or a cloud or a mushroom cloud. She took the best three or four drawings or patterns of colors and put them all together into just four different slides and that became the artwork. It took her a while—hard work! But I think we’re really happy with it. It’s our artwork and we didn’t pay someone to do something that didn’t really represent us. It’s like colorful and bright but also the dark—nuclear bombs. So I think we’re all really happy with it.
What’s changed most since the Imaginary EP last year?
Its hard to say—a lot of the songs we put on the album, we had written at the time of the EP. I think the EP and the album together are sort of the same musical theme. But the recordings are better and the mastering is a lot better, so it’s just sort of louder and bigger. In terms of writing and style of the music there’s not that much difference, although we left a lot of the stronger songs for the album and not the EP. The EP—we just stuck in a couple good songs that would not have made the album. When we’re through with this album and touring, we’ll have to regroup and see where we’re at artistically and figure out if we want to record in a different way or write in a different way.
How was CMJ this year?
Charles Mahoney: It’s really fun to go to. South By Southwest has become really corporate—there’s a lot of money in it now and everything is sponsored by Pepsi. It seems like CMJ wants to be that way but its not. Big bands don’t really go to it and it’s still a little bit under the radar. But it’s fun going around New York seeing other bands play and playing in these bizarre venues or venues you would never really go to. The networking is more for the music business people, you know—like managers and publicists, labels, all those good people. I think it’s really good for bands that are getting really huge right at that moment. For us, we just look at it as having a good time and we do interviews and whatever. New people see us for sure. It’s not so much about meeting other bands I guess. It’s kind of like hit and miss. This time we played with a cool French band from Paris called Jordan and they were straight from France. That was pretty neat—we hung out with them a little bit so we met a band and maybe made connections that we otherwise may not have made. I don’t think bands should look at it as like ‘we’re gonna go here and we’re gonna make connections that will further our career.’ I think that they should go there and have a good time and that’s it. It’s just an excuse to party. Some bands are forced to go by their labels or managers. Usually the little ones think they’re going to go and become huge—the rest just go to have a good time.
What’s the next big goal for Happy Hollows?
Charles Mahoney: Our only goal is to make better music than we did before. That’s it. The album is a representation of what the band has done for the past 2 or 3 years. We’re always just excited to write songs and experiment and make new and interesting music. If that goal is achieved than we’re happy!

THE HAPPY HOLLOWS IN RESIDENCY EVERY MONDAY IN NOVEMBER AT SPACELAND, 1717 SILVERLAKE BLVD., SILVER LAKE. 9 PM / FREE / 21+. TONIGHT THE HAPPY HOLLOWS PERFORM WITH PEPPER RABBIT, DIRT DRESS AND A SPECIAL GUEST. CLUBSPACELAND.COM. THE HAPPY HOLLOWS’ SPELLS IS AVAILABLE NOW FROM THE BAND. VISIT THE HAPPY HOLLOWS AT MYSPACE.COM/THEHAPPYHOLLOWS.

Download: Dam-Funk “Hood Pass Intact”

(off Toeachizown Vol. 4: Hood out now on Stones Throw)

Dam-Funk grew up on “Scooby Doo” and sessioned for Westside Connection but his life’s work was and will be the stewardship of the true spirit of funk. He’s remixed Baron Zen and Animal Collective and he’s just about to release the 5XLP monster Toeachizown on Stones Throw. This interview by Chris Ziegler.

What happened when you saw your first UFO?
Dam-Funk: It was an orb—a light. It wasn’t just me who saw it. It had an orange glow and it flew across the sky—and nobody talked about it! I still don’t know what it was. But it struck my interest. I always knew better things were out there. I made a song about it—‘Brookside Park’ on Vol. 4—the one called Hood. Listen to the lyrics and you’ll get the visual and how the music sounded to me that day. It changed my life. I started listening to Art Bell’s ‘Coast To Coast.’
How does an experience like that affect what you do with music?
Dam-Funk: That’s part of my inspiration. The reason there are so many distractions on earth—like ‘social networking’ and shit—is that they want you not to concentrate on what else is going on. Because they already know! We get to muddle in Kanye and Taylor Swift but there are other things going on! Sometimes you get stories here and there—‘They found other planets!’ But there’s got to be something beyond what we’re muddling through with this bullshit. I wanna create something now and later on when we get our heads together, maybe my music will be the soundtrack—when we have clear minds and concentrate on other things. Not the petty gossip airhead experience. People are excited about the upper surface, but that’s just the busted pie crust. I wanna be the inside of the pie, not the outside crust!
What’s inside the pie?
Dam-Funk: I wanna deal with mass people thinking along the same lines. If we need change, we’ve all got to get together and make it happen. I got this thing called N.O.N.C.A.T.—it’s funny to some people but I try to practice it everyday. It stands for ‘Not One Negative Comment Action or Thought.’ Let’s at least contribute to getting rid of all this stupid shit going on here! You don’t have to be happy-go-lucky howling in peoples’ faces, but be positive—contribute to a higher level of thinking and the world will start changing. It doesn’t have to be all mystical. But this world can be better—let’s try and do something!
What’s the connection between funk and science-fiction?
Dam-Funk: Funk is the real music of the urban city. Not R&B and not soul—those are great genres of black expression. Trust me. But funk is the one that even expands it more. It was always the people who were a little bit different—people who went out and found new shit. Unfortunately, a lot of drugs in the late ’70s knocked us out of the box. Who woulda known? ‘Crack—it’s the cool new shit!’ Everybody fell for it. A lot of people never recovered. But it was definitely deeper than soul and R&B. Soul and R&B were more about hits. Funk had more real shit inside. It was more a backroom type of expression—the smell of sex! Even sadness. ‘He’s in a funk!’
Dawn Silva told us true funk is hard to control—do you agree?
Dam-Funk: I think she has a point. But one day I would hope people open up. But in a way, I don’t give a fuck if they don’t catch on. Like I talk about Gary Wilson—he doesn’t need to be on the radio. He’s cool—he has his own crowd. Funk will always have its own crowd.
You were funk’s lone defender in L.A.—what’s it like to be the guy who won’t give up?
Dam-Funk: There’s always the truth out there. It happened to Caron Wheeler. Erykah Badu came with the same concept—the headwraps, the look straight from Africa, the incense-burning. And Caron Wheeler was the first. Sometimes it’s timing and sometimes people aren’t ready … and sometimes people do your shit and do it better! But I always wondered—who was the OTHER James Brown? Maybe before him—in a city where they didn’t ever quite get it? Or the other Prince down in San Diego somewhere, but Prince happened to get signed? You can’t complain but it just happens. I thank God Peanut Butter Wolf allowed me to get my side of the story out. I know a lot of people do the ’80s-influenced thing. I guarantee when you listen to Toeachizown, it’s not even ’80s—it’s modern funk. I’m not trying to recreate. I wanna give somebody something new. It’s still the original inspiration, but I try to continue where it got broken off!
Where was it broken off?
Dam-Funk: After P-Funk was interrupted at Warner and they went to regulate on Clinton. ‘Man, you’re a little too up there.’ The concept was getting crazy and getting peoples’ minds open and they had business problems, too. They did revitalize with ‘Atomic Dog.’ But those albums were like pre-Public Enemy—The Electric Spanking of War Babies in 1981 and no one knows it because they didn’t promote it! It was right after Trombipulation—the Parliament album with the elephant nose—and they just regulated on George. ‘Hold on!’ After that, RUN-DMC dropped on Profile and that changed the game, so all the majors were like, ‘Fuck funk—too many big-ass bands! Too many horns!’ It was still made on independent labels—slicked up and geared to dance and that was boogie! Boogie took over—Prelude, Salsoul, West End—and it wasn’t called disco because they’d burn disco records.
Why do you think people felt like they had to physically destroy those records?
Dam-Funk: It could be as simple as people saying, ‘We couldn’t enjoy it.’ Or more deep—‘This is some shit that gays and people of color and whites can all come together—this is dangerous! We can’t have that happen!’ I don’t wanna say conspiracy but you wonder! Radio went nuts on disco—too much disco! Then real labels like Philadelphia International and Salsoul got lumped in with all the major labels and fake groups—fake disco! But Teddy Pendergrass and the O’Jays, they didn’t call it disco. It was black dance music! A 4/4 beat and people could dance—uptempo R&B and it was great! But it was thrown under the rug—bringing too many people together.
How do you know when it’s fake?
Dam-Funk: You can always tell. I’m gonna always be changing. I’ll always be funk-based, but I like too much other stuff to be the same cat. The next album probably won’t be the same sound. You can tell when they’re a copycat. Now everybody is into an 808/Lil Wayne sound and a blippy beat sound and trippy club music—you know, people wanna get in and get money. I can’t be mad—it’s a capitalist country—but don’t you have integrity, you fuck?
Is this why you’ll shout out the names of the musicians when you’re doing a DJ set?
Dam-Funk: I feel the people who did the work didn’t get enough props. And it’s not for the artists alone—it’s for the listening public. If I’m at a club and I play a certain song, they might be timid to come up and ask. People deserve to know who the artists are.
Is Toeachizown your life’s work?
Dam-Funk: I feel funk has never been given an opportunity to be released like this. That’s why I give it up to Stones Throw—funk was always on a major or a real small label, and this time it’s on a small label but in a new era where a small label can do something like this. The verdict is out, but I hope when the judge’s hammer slams down, people will look back and say, ‘This dude stuck to his guns and he did a funk record from beginning to end. And it wasn’t just funk—he even did new wave rock! The funk had all the influences!’ Prince—‘Let’s Pretend We’re Married’—that’s new wave! Funkadelic did rock songs—‘Cosmic Slop!’ That was killing a lot of early metal! I’m being positive but it’s definitely not gonna be a Mayer Hawthorne out-of-the-box hit. But I’d rather have the slow burn. Ten years from now—‘Man, that dude did what he believed in!’
You sessioned for Ice Cube—what did you learn from him?
Dam-Funk: That was some real shit! I learned what people respect—it’s the passion. The fact that you mean serious business about your writing. I even look at ‘Dateline NBC’ sometimes—the host is so fucking into his shit! Me and my lady will be rollin’—‘That’s what I’m talking about! Look how he pronounces his words!’ We’d laugh at first but that dude’s killing it. ‘Dateline’—that’s that shit! With the realest cats—game recognizes game! They respect you if you’re true to your shit. Once you try and fake it, that’s when your ass gets whipped. They knew I could play keys and they saw my talent. I wasn’t scared because I grew up on that shit. I’d see the guns and be like, ‘OK, cool—no big deal.’ When they see you ain’t tripping, you’re invited to the party. ‘I don’t give a fuck how you look—that motherfucker is cool!’ When I do my own thing, those cats are like, ‘Cool—I knew you were gonna do that funk stuff!’
What do the guys in Animal Collective most have in common with Ice Cube?
Dam-Funk: They stick to their guns. Cube—I definitely respected that cat. He was born the same day as me! You could tell he was serious about his business. A lot of people thought those guys were buffoons. This was the same guy who went to Priority and took a bat—he was really serious about getting his money—and busted the window! But sometimes you gotta do that. I hate to say it and I don’t wanna do it, but I’ve been in situations where you have to handle shit. You have to keep respect and integrity on your side. If people see you respect your life and work, they’ll respect you as well. ‘You can’t do that to me—I care!’ Animal Collective started on the porch and then got into drum machines and atmosphere and electronics—now look!
Where do you and Todd Rundgren overlap as musicians?
Dam-Funk: He has heart! It wasn’t about hits, even though he could make hits if he chose to. That’s the aesthetic I like to align myself with. I’m the same person as back in the day when I was riding my bike to the record store in Pasadena. Hits are hits, and they’re great! But the music I gravitate to—maybe because I’m a weirdo?—it’s not on the radio. At a certain point, you grow out of the radio. ‘I love music so much that I’m gonna look for this rare 12” that only did 500 copies!’ That independent release—that’s some of the most magical music out there. No matter how much money or accolades I might get, I always wanna do music for that person who was me. That kid who ventures off looking for music that touches their soul.
What was the first concert you ever went to where you felt that way?
Dam-Funk: Kiss and Mötley Crüe at the Universal Amphitheatre. I couldn’t believe the way Paul Stanley was cussing! ‘This is not like the records!’—I finally got it. They couldn’t put those lyrics on the record—this was before N.W.A. busted the door open. But at the concert, it was like, ‘We’re gonna party tonight, motherfuckers! Make some fucking noise!’ It was incredible, man. I thought, ‘You can really be YOU in concert!’
How do you feel when you’re on stage?
Dam-Funk: I’m on for the people. They paid their money and they’re seeing art. It’s like in an art gallery—I’m the painting they’re looking at, so I have to give them the visual and audio satisfaction to experience their night.
What do you think of L.A.’s music now? Bands like HEALTH and clubs like Low End Theory that are connecting all different kinds of music together?
Dam-Funk: I think L.A.’s got a pretty healthy scene right now. People wanna work together and cross-pollinate. The Internet has diversified things. In the ‘70s and ‘80s, it wasn’t as close-knit. Now black-white-Filipino-Asians-Middle Easterners whatever—we all hang out in the same places. We all communicate. So why not have the music come together and feed this grand experiment? I coulda took my shit straight to a major, but Stones Throw opened the door for a more experimental thing. It’s not just me—it’s about everybody! I do shows in Portland or San Francisco and there’s all colors in there. And it wasn’t lopsided—not like R&B shows where it’s only one side or ultra-rock shows where it’s only one side. It’s everybody! That’s what I hope the future is. I don’t wanna be too contrived—like, ‘Oh, God, this is kind of corny!’ But that’s the natural direction—so far, so good!
Who in L.A. would you most want to work with now?
Dam-Funk: SFV Acid. I like him a lot. I’m just trying to play my part and contribute what I can do. I’m watching everybody and working with different people. The closest thing I have solidified is me and Nite Jewel are gonna do something on Stones Throw together. She’s my buddy! And Cole who was also in Ariel Pink’s band—Ariel and Cole are chill with me. When we were in O.C., we were laughing together about Phantasm—horror movies! We’re all connected more than people think. When the time comes, everything happens naturally and people see that connection, you know what I mean?
You’re a Gemini—what’s your hidden side?
Dam-Funk: That’s one thing my lady laughs about. One side is positive and I treat people great. When I walk with my lady, I walk on the curb side! I respect my elders, even when I’m announcing songs and telling people the groups! But there’s another darker side. If somebody crosses the line, I definitely wanna whup ass, but I gotta check that! I haven’t run into any negativity. The only thing I’ve been hearing is that I better be prepared for critique. Where I’m from, if someone calls me out on my name and gets too crazy, you go looking for ‘em! Now I’m a recording artist—I can’t be out chasing every blogger.
Maybe it would be a better world if you did.
Dam-Funk: Yeah, I know! But I can’t waste my time on that. You know what cures me? I just look at Obama. I’m not saying he’s the Savior, but you know how many hate mails and threats he gets each day? And he walks those stairs looking like nothing is bothering him. This dude is taking the brunt of all types of shit and still looks as cool as possible. You gotta brush it off. I’m trying. I’m not perfect. It’s definitely more the light I try and share.
Is that why you bring Sprite and candy every time you visit Stones Throw?
Dam-Funk: You heard about that? I do it because I know they’re working hard! When I was at jobs, I woulda loved that. ‘Why doesn’t anybody do anything special for us? We’re working hard for these fools—can somebody do something?’ So that’s why I do it—thanks a lot, guys!

DAM-FUNK ON SUN., NOV. 1, AT AMOEBA RECORDS, 6400 SUNSET BLVD., HOLLYWOOD. 4 PM / FREE / ALL AGES. AMOEBARECORDS.COM. DAM-FUNK’S TOEACHIZOWN 5XLP RELEASES TUE., OCT 27, ON STONES THROW. VISIT DAM-FUNK AT STONESTHROW.COM/DAMFUNK OR MYSPACE.COM/DAMFUNK.

L.A. RECORD has been lucky enough to watch Low End Theory grow into one of the most exciting and vital music communities in Los Angeles, and some of our favorite interviews (and memories!) come from Low End Theory artists and residents like Flying Lotus, Gaslamp Killer, Nobody, Daedelus, Nosaj Thing, Samiyam, Dibia$e, Thavius Beck, Gangi, Crystal Antlers, the Entrance band and of course Daddy Kev, who holds the distinction of being the first person (but definitely not the last person) to get naked on an L.A. RECORD cover. (Pictured above—issue 21 from volume 1, lovingly assembled on Charlie’s futon.)

Tonight’s celebration will be the eleventh Unreleased Beat Invitational, featuring a destroying line-up of Flying Lotus, Jneiro Jarel, Free The Robots, Samiyam, Dibi$se and Matthewdavid with opening sets by L.A. RECORD contributors Kutmah and Nobody plus My Hollow Drum, Nocando and Daddy Kev. In honor of this birthday, we’ve linked the entire Low End Theory Podcast Series, and below we’re re-publishing this ancient Daddy Kev interview from the archives—done months before Low End even started. Congratulations and thanks to Kev and everyone who makes Low End Theory happen!

Download: Low End Theory Podcast Vol. 1: Daddy Kev + Samiyam

Download: Low End Theory Podcast Vol. 2: Nobody + Mike Slott

Download: Low End Theory Podcast Vol. 3: Gaslamp Killer + Ras G

Download: Low End Theory Podcast Vol. 4: D-Styles + Nosaj Thing

Download: Low End Theory Podcast Vol. 5: Daddy Kev + Daedelus

Download: Low End Theory Podcast Vol. 6: Nobody + Mono/Poly

Download: Low End Theory Podcast Vol. 7: Gaslamp Killer + Mary Anne Hobbs

Download: Low End Theory Podcast Vol. 8: D-Styles + Glitch Mob

DADDY KEV: PURE AUDIO PLEASURE (FEB. 2006 INTERVIEW)

Harbor City madman Daddy Kev came into music as an intern for Urb during high school and began producing beats with an Akai sampler and some ideas for 8-bar loops. Now he runs Alpha Pup records (between Myspace requests to DJ house parties) and has produced tracks for everyone from Sage Francis and Shapeshifters to his own Alpha Pup alums like Awol One and Busdriver. He speaks while watching a mugging in downtown Los Angeles. This interview by Chris Ziegler.

What makes a beat work for a certain artist—like how do you decide which is a Busdriver beat and which is an Awol beat?
Daddy Kev: Usually, it’s pretty obvious to me who’s gonna sound best over a particular song—and you’d be surprised how often I’m wrong about that. My stuff is pretty much custom-made, but what ends up happening is I’ll be all hyped—‘They’re gonna love it!’—and they hear it and they’re just like, ‘What? Aw, naw.’ So what happens is the beat gets reused. Usually I don’t let people know—‘Hey, this is a beat three guys passed on!’—but I don’t make like a big deal that it’s custom-made, either. Strangely enough, some of my more popular songs have been like that. My song on the Sage Francis record—like seven or eight people passed on that beat.
Is Sage gonna read this and be bummed?
Daddy Kev: Yeah, right? I sent him the CD and didn’t hear back for months—figured he passed on it. Then I got a call six months later: ‘Dude, that beat’s insane—lemme rap over it!’ And that was one of my bigger blow-up songs of last year.
How can you tell when a beat by itself is going to be good?
Daddy Kev: I never conceptualize myself as a by-themselves type of musical artist—I don’t think of it until it’s got a vocal on it and it’s taken to the next phase. People over the years ask many times: ‘Where’s the Daddy Kev solo album? Where’s the instrumentals?’ Maybe it’s even set my career back. But I love the collaborative aspect of music—that’s what keeps it fresh and interesting to me. I don’t like the idea of being in my own little world, not being checked by other people. When I was a kid listening, I’d wonder: ‘How did they make this? What was it like?’ The whole industry has fascinated me forever. To be honest, I think the age of music we’re living in now—the music industry being revolutionized by the digital world—is perhaps one of the most exciting times to be involved in music.
Alpha Pup has really jumped on the digital thing, too.
Daddy Kev: We’re phasing out CDs. And some people look at me like I’m crazy. But to anyone looking objectively, it’s pretty damn clear. The whole thing is moving to another plateau. I love it because we’re truly looking at the final frontier of how music is going to be distributed and consumed—the only step past digital is people injecting music into their veins. For the next hundred years, how our kids and their kids will be buying music—all the rules are being written right now. It’s so fascinating for a great many ways. And it can really liberate artists and a label, by not having to deal with manufacturing and costs—we can be more daring. We can drop whatever we think is good.
Do you still sample off the radio?
Daddy Kev: I sure do. One of the advantages of being in Los Angeles is there’s such variety in the radio programs. It reached a point with sampling where I felt like everybody had everything—albeit that isn’t the case, but it started bothering me a little bit. It started bothering me that some of the bigger things I’ve done were samples that people could now easily get. So the next level is I gotta start sampling stuff that isn’t available—that you can’t buy. Maybe it just broadcasts once; maybe never before. I try and capture those. On the jazz stations, they do regular shows where guys come out and bust out the old quarter-inch tape and they’re even telling you: ‘I’ve never even played this for anybody before!’ And I have a DAT and let it roll, then go back and review. If I find one thing for every ten hours—one thing that can be made into something—then it’s all worth it.
What’s the next level after that?
Daddy Kev: What I’m seeing for the next couple years is a combination of the real outlandish rare sampling combined with electronic layering and drum machines. At least in hip-hop, those have been different camps—you’ve got the synth cats and the hardcore sample cats, but not many people try and go in between. Daedelus is a great embodiment, and it’s something I’ve been trying to improve on. I’ve been layering my beats with electronic kick drums and 808s for years—people say ‘you got that organic sound,’ and sure, but by the same token, I layer it with the rap drums to give it that kick out. I don’t think of music as competition in that there’s a first and second place, but being in a town in LA, there are a lot of people out there that this is their dream, and that alone keeps me on my toes. I feel like I consistently have to do better than I’ve done before—at least to be able to look in the mirror in the morning!
What records will always have something there for you to use, no matter how many times you go back to them?
Daddy Kev: Funkadelic—either by myself or in the car or in the DJ booth, those songs will always remain timeless. It’s music I consider to be perfect, if you will.
How about records that you save just for listening for fun—that you know you can’t use in your own work?
Daddy Kev: A lot of rock stuff—when I listen to the Unicorns, I’m definitely not listening to listen to production values or mix quality. To me that’s pure audio pleasure. And I love reggae music, but there’s very little reggae element in any of the music I’ve ever done. Steel Pulse, Black Uhuru—when I listen to that, my mind is the furthest it could be from thinking of work. But then listening to someone like Lee “Scratch” Perry is when the lightbulb flips on again. With records that are overly engineered, I go into dissection mode—or ones that are completely poorly done, thinking ‘This is what I could have done…’
What records would you remix if you could go back and get in the studio?
Daddy Kev: That’s a loaded question—‘Whose record have you worked on that’s wack?’ It’s gonna sound terrible, but groups that fell off—A Tribe Called Quest or De La Soul, where you hear their later records and think ‘Oh my God, who said yes to this? Who was the guy in the room who was like, “Yeah, that’s perfect!”?’ I’m definitely at a point where I will retire before I start making wack shit—granted, a lot of people tell themselves that, but then go on to make terrible albums. I try to look at stuff as objectively as possible—if I made a beat wack, I’m the first to admit it. A lot of people keep going—it’s hard to think about going back. ‘That job doing data entry in Irvine is sounding good right now.’ But when the day comes where I got nothing left in in me, I’ll recognize it.
What’s a career you’d like to follow?
Daddy Kev: Rick Rubin. He has label success, he’s able to stay current, and he continues to produce albums and music that are astonishing. You gotta walk that line carefully: between creating music and marketing music. But one thing that will never change is my fundamental respect for the art.
Even if you grow a giant Rick Rubin beard?
Daddy Kev: When I’m in a Jay Z video, I know I’ve made it.

Download: Marco Paul “The Heavenly Music Corporation”

(for a complete play list please visit dublab.com)

For ten years, since the days when ‘Internet radio’ was as futuristic a concept as the electric car, dublab has been adding color, texture and depth to music in Los Angeles and the world beyond. Hip-hop and soul and jazz and psych and punk and folk and cosmic genius and more—whether from L.A., from deep history or from someplace no one’s even sure about—all find a permanent home at dublab.com as well as in the work of an army of DJs and artists and musicians and listeners who constantly prove that there is always something new and beautiful to listen to and learn about. Labrats Frosty and Ale meet at Girl House to talk about their anniversary. This interview by Chris Ziegler and Drew Denny.

Daedelus said dublab started when a bunch of super-nerds at USC found each other—true?
Mark “Frosty” McNeill (co-founder and president): Lies! Where is that guy? The ‘nerds’ part is very very accurate. Intense record geeks is probably a good description. The whole idea—we don’t know everything and we always wanted to stay open. We always wanted to discover, get turned on to something new. We were trying to share something with our listeners and we discover things along the way, so it always remains fresh. You learn more and more. You never know what direction it will take you.
Brad from Wounded Lion was saying that as a kid he learned from Rodney on the ROQ that all eras of rock ‘n’ roll are friends. I’d even say all genres of music are friends.
Mark McNeill: They’re all connected. There is a lineage. Everything is derivative and that’s not a negative term. Everything influences everything. That’s the whole idea: keep it open and broad. When we started on Real Media Player or Windows Media Player, it was in the midst of all that Internet stuff. We got a lot of free lunches and heard the word ‘synergy’ a lot.
Didn’t you almost have a million-dollar investment?
Mark McNeill: We were offered money before we even launched. I was fresh out of college and I’d sit in meetings with these people and think, ‘If you’re dumb enough to want to give us money, there’s something wrong with your company and you’re not gonna last.’ Everything was very shaky. We had one investor—the only one who seemed good. He was basically the guy who came up with the banner ad. He had tons of money. We were days away from signing papers and everybody was ready to do it. He was giving us money and then the morning the NASDAQ crashed, we got a phone call and my partner Jon’s face just fell. The conversation was basically, ‘I think we need to re-think the nature of our investment.’
Shoulda got the guy who invented the Viagra ad.
Mark McNeill: We do! He’s here—Ale, pull down your pants!
Alejandro Cohen (general manager and treasurer): In the long run, maybe it was a blessing in disguise.
Mark McNeill: We said no to everything for so long. There was such hucksterism in it. Very in the moment. It’s like a pop trend that’s on the radio. You see it from the start—it’s a flavor of the moment. If you take it as that and have fun, it’s cool. But don’t imagine it’s gonna be around for twenty years. All that stuff was a fly-by-night vibe. We probably would have been done nine years ago if we’d taken some of that money.
You’ve DJed at places like LACMA—do you think big institutions fetishize the DJ as a symbol of what’s cool?
Alejandro Cohen: Yeah. They ask, ‘What’s your DJ name? Just, uh, Ale?’
Mark McNeill: For the past three years we’ve done a lot of ‘cultural institution’ gigs. They’re cool because they’re not at places where people wanna go crazy and slide across the bar. It’s kids, families, all ages—people that are not gonna be at Part Time Punks. They trip out on seeing records. It’s weird.
How were you able to make dublab a place where Damo Suzuki, Linda Perhacs and Neil Hamburger can all feel equally at home?
Mark McNeill: We have really good incense!
Alejandro Cohen: You lose perspective on the variety of music because it all mixes. I’ll be visiting friends back home and play dublab for them to give them an idea of where I work. For them, it’s extreme worlds mixing in one place, but to me it sounds kind of like the same place. Latin to the other guy doing Middle Eastern . . .
Mark McNeill: Maybe it makes them nauseous.
What are the extreme limits of dublab’s programming?
Mark McNeill: The oldest music comes from Jonathan of Excavated Shellac—a lot of international 78s from the ’20s.
Alejandro Cohen: Some of the stuff Danny Holloway plays, it’s the only copy maybe existing. He did an all-Beatles covers set and was telling me about it. Stuff from Cambodia and weird things he knows. He’s certain they’re pretty much gone forever. Like ‘Hey Jude’ with steel drums—versions where you’re like, ‘What the hell?’
Mark McNeill: Or a lot of those $1,000 45s—B+ will come back from traveling and he’ll bring stuff from Addis Ababa. Original Ethiopian 45s. The idea is to bring it back to the old soul days when people would cut a record and then immediately go play it on the radio. Stuff like that. We play versions that never come out. Weird studio things.
What’s it like to hold the last-ever copy of something in your hands?
Mark McNeill: You should just eat it so it’s part of you! Cats like Jonathan—the records he specializes in are international. It wasn’t for export, it was for those locales. Cambodian records sold in villages but on RCA Victor. They survived in these places that were a pretty harsh atmosphere since the ’20s. They aren’t collector cultures. You get something new and throw the record away.
What kind of people would you have never met except for dublab?
Mark McNeill: We wouldn’t even have met each other if it wasn’t for music. That camaraderie of geeks!
Alejandro Cohen: When I was a kid, I was a very scared kind of guy. I’d look at people who play instruments and be like, ‘Oh, you must be so serious! I don’t deserve any of your time—you must have such important ideas.’ And at the end, most turn out not to! But in music you DO meet people with great ideas, and you feel honored to give them a ride somewhere!
Mark McNeill: The guys from Cluster were a treat.
Alejandro Cohen: They were joking about Brian Eno not being a strong boy.
Mark McNeill: They were living in the countryside of Germany and Eno was coming in from England—kind of a glammy boy. They’d be out chopping wood and all this stuff to warm the house—Roedelius is like a big lumberjack grandpa!—and Eno would be like, ‘I wanna chop wood!’ ‘Go back inside, sissy boy—we’ll make music later!’
When you interviewed James Brown, was it before or after his wife got ass implants?
Mark McNeill: Before she did but after I did. We had the same doctor. One of them fell out and now I have to wear a thick wallet. Have you ever been to the Experience Music Project? I don’t know if they still have it, but they had a ride like ‘DISCOVER FUNK MUSIC,’ like an EPCOT Center total after-school special thing. There were two kids and they turn into an alley and Bootsy Collins and James Brown spin around with sparkles coming off and the screen goes, ‘And now—INTO THE FUNK!’ And you go through James Brown’s legs. It’s nuts. It’s probably from the mid-’90s and really fucking bad. Or did you ever see the Miles Davis scooter ads? Lou Reed and Miles Davis—both at fucked-up points in their life. Miles Davis in a parachute pantsuit and stuff. Weird.
Alejandro Cohen: I’d love to have seen them shooting that. ‘Just give me the check!’
What would a horrible dublab commercial be like?
Mark McNeill: Nick Harcourt-y. ‘It’s 2012 and the city is bumping—the spirit of the night!’ We were thinking we should make one for Cinefamily with robots and stuff. ‘Morning becomes … erotic!’
Do you have the same relationship with KCRW that we do with L.A. WEEKLY?
Alejandro Cohen: KXLU has that relationship.
Mark McNeill: There are people there that are true music fans, but when you build a machine depending on that money, then they’re not any different than commercial radio as far as money and power. They rely on their fund drive so much they can’t take chances. The DJs there are great people and music fans but they tread so lightly. It’s like when I was at KUSC. It’s elevator music—classical music. They found their subscriber base and they keep them happy and that’s it. So it’s not such a service. When you have power like that and you can’t take chances, you should.
Anytime anything declares itself ‘independent,’ it’s sort of a political act. Why is it important for dublab to be independent?
Alejandro Cohen: In a good sense of the word, I’m ‘stuck’ with what I am. That’s what we do. I couldn’t do a conscious commercial thing.
Mark McNeill: All that stuff has a purpose. Certain people do certain things. Maybe they’re just happy with it. We try not to judge what people are up to; we try to give them an opportunity to get something different.
How important to a healthy music community is the sort of infrastructure dublab provides?
Mark McNeill: When we started, the idea was we’d be a for-profit business that did good things with the profits, that was grassroots/community-based. But there was never a profit! You look at Ben & Jerry’s—‘Cool, we’ll make money and support farmers!’ Not that we wanna make ice cream, but nonprofit is in line with the original idea. It fits in with the ethos of why we started dublab. If you go nonprofit, the public owns it. It’s the idea of the listeners being part of it.
Alejandro Cohen: It almost makes the mission of dublab more genuine. There’s not a guy behind it getting rich or hoping to get rich. Even the live sessions are all through a Creative Commons license. So in a sense it really is doing it for the music. Through the years, dublab found itself operating more on a nonprofit model. We were an LLC, but we were doing fundraisers and projects mostly with museums and cultural institutions—we had to do the switch! When we were applying, I was a bit afraid. But a friend of mine who’s worked for many nonprofits said this is very very common—organizations operating for ten or fifteen years with no status at all and then they switch.
Mark McNeill: It’s all very fragile. I remember my grandfather, the last thing he ever said was, ‘You know what? Do what you wanna do. You’ll be much happier. Do what you wanna do. I went through my whole life worrying.’ When I was at USC, most of my friends were film students and some make really good money. Some have Mercedes and houses they bought. I’m somewhat envious. I wish I had a car that wouldn’t break down! But they’re envious of me doing something I dig. I spend my day around good people. I put a little time into the world of bullshit and it’s much more fulfilling to be around intelligent people who are creative. That’s part of the reason for being nonprofit. We don’t wanna bow to the wishes of someone selling the flavor of the moment. We think of a more timeless aesthetic, something that isn’t commercially viable. That’s a major reason to go nonprofit. You can be timeless.

DUBLAB’s TENTH ANNIVERSARY EXPLORATION RUNS FROM THUR., OCT. 1, THROUGH SAT., OCT. 10, AT MULTIPLE LOS ANGELES VENUES INCLUDING THE ‘VIBRANT VISIONS’ RETROSPECTIVE AT THE CONTINENTAL GALLERY ON THUR., OCT. 1; A LABRAT MATINEE FILM SCREENING WITH LIVE PERFORMANCE BY DAEDELUS AT THE DOWNTOWN INDEPENDENT ON FRI., OCT. 2; THE FUTURE ROOTS STAGE CURATED BY DUBLAB AT THE EAGLE ROCK MUSIC FEST ON COLORADO BLVD. IN EAGLE ROCK ON SAT., OCT. 3; DUBLAB MEETS PART TIME PUNKS AT THE ECHO ON SUN., OCT. 4; GIVE UP: SAD FILM SCREENINGS WITH SORROWFUL LIVE SCORES AT CINEFAMILY ON MON., OCT. 5; DECKADES AT THE VERDUGO BAR ON TUE., OCT. 6; A LIVE PERFORMANCE BY LINDA PERHACS AND FRIENDS (INCLUDING HECUBA, CRYSTAL ANTLERS AND MORE) AT REDCAT ON WED., OCT. 7; DUBLAB AT THE DOWNTOWN ARTWALK AT THE CONTINENTAL GALLERY ON THUR., OCT. 8; A JOHN LENNON BIRTHDAY BED-IN RADIO BROADCAST LIVE ON KPFK 90.7-FM ON FRI., OCT. 9; AND A FINALE BASH WITH REPRESENTATIVES FROM INTERNATIONAL MUSIC ROOM, MAS EXITOS, SKETCHBOOK, TONALISM AND MORE AT A VENUE TBA ON SAT., OCT. 10. MORE INFORMATION AT DUBLAB.COM/EVENTS. LISTEN TO DUBLAB AT DUBLAB.COM.

Exene Cervenka helped invent what Los Angeles is now and helped save the best of what it used to be. She releases a new solo album Somewhere Gone on Bloodshot in October and is moving back to California after years in a historic farmhouse in Missouri. She speaks now while camping on the beach. This interview by Chris Ziegler.

How do you feel America’s garbage has changed in the last thirty or forty years?
Ooh—interesting. It’s changed for the worse. The garbage that I used to find on the streets was a lot better because it was regional garbage and now it’s just national garbage.
What specifically have we lost in our garbage?
Flyers for fortunetellers. Candy wrappers that only exist in certain places.
Do you agree with Philip K. Dick that the symbols of the divine show up initially at the trash stratum?
Sure—I think that’s neat.
Lydia Lunch once said that you and her share a similar moral imperative—to tell the truth about injustices to the individual and to scream into the void. Do you think that’s true?
I think that’s something more strident than I would see myself as being. I definitely feel like I’m not giving a voice to the voiceless—now I’m giving myself a voice. I don’t know what imperative means. I understand what it means but I also think that—I don’t know, ‘moral’ is a weird word. I like it. I like the word ‘morality’ but that is a weird concept. I just try to be a compassionate human being. I’m trying to make myself a better person as I go along.
How hard has that been to learn how to do?
Easy once you get the hang of it.
Do you think that’s necessary in music to have that?
Yes. Is it necessary to treat people okay? It is for me. Maybe not for you.
Maybe for me.
Maybe not for the next guy but for you or me, yeah.
You said once that most of your songs are written about love but that’s not to say they aren’t political. The Monks have said that all songs are love songs at heart—what’s the overlap there?
I’m just trying to take that in. Every song is a love song? Yeah, I’d agree with that. Because you love what you’re writing about.
They also said love is the only way to get out of your own ego and connect with something bigger than yourself.
Yes, I agree with that.
What’s a moment in your own life when that became apparent?
Now. Now in the more general sense. I agree with that completely. When I got diagnosed with MS—that is when it became apparent to me.
Did that diagnosis change the way you write and work?
It doesn’t change that, unfortunately. You’d think it would make you more… Well, I work pretty hard as it is so I’m not gonna work harder—but it doesn’t really change that stuff because why should it? At some point it’ll bite me in the ass but right now I’m healthy.
There’s a line by the poet Anna Akhmatova…
Oh, I love her—she’s my favorite poet. She’s great, especially considering she wrote that stuff in the teens and the twenties. Well, not all of it—but the stuff she wrote in the teens and the twenties is so relevant and so good.
In one poem she asks, ‘Why is this century worse than those others?’
I think everyone thinks their century is worse than the others. I think that question can be answered. We don’t know if it’s the worst, or if things will get worse. I believe things will get worse in our culture and our economy and in the world in general—I think water shortages and things like that. I mean we’re dealing with a bad economy, but other people are dealing with much worse and that’s gonna continue.
How do you think things have changed in your lifetime?
It’s kind of a big perspective now. I thank the hippies for health food every day—I’m grateful to them every day I eat and I think that generation changed the world for the better. They didn’t change it completely but I definitely have a lot of respect and gratitude to that generation. The generation previous to mine. And the feminists for doing what they could in their times to try and make women somewhat equal, which will probably never happen.
What makes you say that?
Because it’s so hard. I’ve struggled my whole life and so has every woman and decent man I know—it’s so hard.
How do you reconcile yourself to the possibility that these kinds of things are going to take longer than maybe any person can imagine?
That depends on if you’re doing the right thing or the wrong thing. If you’re doing the right thing then the outcome doesn’t really matter because your goal is to do the right thing, not to change the world.
Mike Watt says when he reads Ulysses now, it seems like a sad book to him—that it seems like the only victories we can have are the tiny victories between people.
No. I don’t agree with that. I think tiny victories are very valuable and personal relationships are very valuable but I think you can aspire to a lot more than that. I would not settle for that, no.
What do you still aspire to? I found a quote where you said you felt you’ve done everything you wanted to do in your life.
Do the same things again better.
How?
Well, that’s the question. That’s my problem, isn’t it?
What do you miss most about the past?
Architecture. The architecture in Los Angeles used to be quite amazing. Architecture everywhere in America used to be amazing—I miss that a lot.
Why do you think that changed?
Because of progress. Yes, that’s what they call it. Because of the economy. Because you have to keep stimulating the economy by tearing down and building again—and sprawl and fear. Los Angeles used to be a really amazing city in the ‘70s, but I miss all that. I wish men wore hats.
And never shorts, either. For decorum.
Yeah—for decorum’s sake.
Can you identify anything in your lifetime that was a tipping point? Where things went the left way and not the right way?
I have those all the time.
Can you identify them as they happen?
No. Immediately after. I’m pretty good at knowing what’s happening. The tipping point is a good thing because it makes you get up and do something about whatever it was that you couldn’t do anything about. It forces your hand.
You once said, ‘I want to be worthwhile in this world, I want to give something—otherwise that’d be selfish.’ Is that the way you feel you have to live?
Yes. Because that’s the way it is. That’s the way it works—because if you don’t do that then it doesn’t work. Society falls apart. Civility is lost. Which may be a good thing. But that’s just the way I choose to live. If somebody came to my door and wanted help, I would help them.
I heard runaways used to show up on your doorstep in the middle of the night.
Well, let me put it this way—if someone needed help, I would help them.
What’s a time when somebody really helped you exactly when you needed it?
You’d be amazed. I have a list of the things since I was diagnosed—I am really, really grateful because I had so many people come to me with advice and help and prayers and thoughts and presents and things. So I think that when that happens, it transforms you.
How does it feel to be living in California again?
Not as strange as you’d think. I haven’t decided yet where I’m moving.
What’s your favorite scene in one of Raymond Chandler’s books?
Oh gee, I read those books so long ago. I can’t really remember. I should re-read those and I should read John Fante while I’m at it. Now that I’m back here I should reacquaint myself with where I am. John Fante—he’s my favorite L.A. writer. Because he just did it the best. I love Raymond Chandler too. And Charles Bukowski and other people. When I moved to L.A. in ’76 there were people just coming back from Vietnam who were hippies when they went that were dropping acid a week before they landed in Vietnam. They still had chops and acid and hippies—it was really neat. And there were still those detective doors in some of the office buildings—you know. The glass doors with the lettering. And the architecture was much more detective-y—much more Marlowe.
When you first moved here, who was the person who taught you about L.A.?
I didn’t have one. It was me and John Doe struggling to find our own way. Everything from the ground up. I came from Florida and he came from Baltimore and we didn’t know anything about California or Los Angeles—we were just trying to figure it out. We’d go to shows, he’d talk our way in—he’d talk the doorman into letting us get in for free to go see the Runaways and Tom Petty and Blondie.
You were talking about punk once and said, ‘We were ghosts then and we’re ghosts now and we’ll haunt your malls and catwalks forever.’
That’s definitely true. Because we thought of stuff that other people didn’t think of and it’s just now starting to disseminate into society—or has been for a while but is kind of starting.
Do you remember the first time you saw the Eagles play?
The Eagles? I saw the Eagles play in Las Vegas about 15 years ago. I was at the Hard Rock Café the night they opened. I wanted to see who they were because I heard so much about them.
Did they live up to everything you’d been told?
Exactly. Hit the nail on the head. They are good musicians—very competent at what they do, very good at what they do.
What a carefully chosen adjective.
Yup. They were very good at what they do.
You use ‘we’ really effectively in your lyrics.
I use ‘I’ too much. I think about myself too much.
Are there any of your songs that you feel have come true?
No. Sometimes they do. ‘New World’ is like that. That comes true every year.
How did you feel on election night last year?
Pretty darn good.
Did you cry at all?
No I didn’t. I had a nice celebration though—we played in Seattle and Eddie Vedder sang ‘The New World’ with us on election night. It was fun. And he slow danced with me.
Did he step on your toes?
No—he’s a great dancer. Are you kidding?
Who’s the best dancer?
John Doe.
Have you ever cried on an election night?
No. I don’t cry for those people. I save my tears for my friends.

EXENE CERVENKA WITH JOHN DOE, AMBER FOX AND DAVID J. CARPENTER ON FRI., SEPT. 11, AT A BENEFIT FOR ANDREA FOLMER AT ALEX’S BAR, 2913 E. ANAHEIM ST., LONG BEACH. 8PM / $10 / 21+. ALEXSBAR.COM. AND WITH JOHN DOE AND KID CONGO POWERS ON FRI., OCT. 9, AT THE ECHOPLEX, 1154 GLENDALE BLVD., LOS ANGELES. 8PM / $25-$27 / 18+. ATTHEECHO.COM. EXENE CERVENKA’S SOMEWHERE GONE RELEASES TUE., OCT. 6, ON BLOODSHOT. VIST EXENE CERVENKA AT EXENECERVENKA.COM OR AT MYSPACE.COM/EXENECERVENKA.