UNDER THE INFLUENCE

OF MUSICIAN AND SONGWRITER BRADFORD COX IN TRANS-ATLANTIC COMMUNICATION

WITH SUZE OLBRICH

AND PHOTOGRAPHED

BY JOE LEAVENWORTH

AT HIS HOME IN ATLANTA, GEORGIA (USA)

ON THE 31 ST OF AUGUST, 2016 Bradford Cox chose the name At- source, nor can Cox’s outlook and own impression of it which was mix is something that I noticed las Sound for his solo musical en- manner, no matter how many glob- about displacement, location and very quickly after mixing it: that TRAVELING MUSIC: A MIX BY BRADFORD COX deavours at ten years of age after al tours his music has taken him on. travel. In order to travel, there has there seems to be this develop- the tape machine on which he re- to be a home that you're travelling ment of tension between unpreten- [TO BE LISTENED TO AT HIGH VOLUME AND ALL AT ONCE] corded his earliest compositions. BRADFORD COX You sound like you away from; and in order for some- tious narrators and cerebral mu- And although it took over a dec- might have listened to my mix. thing to seem foreign to you, you sic makers, a high contrast which ade for that moniker to grace a re- SUZE OLBRICH I did, and then I had to have to have a sense of the do- wasn't my initial goal, but it does cord, there was no time when mu- go for a long walk. mestic. So I started thinking of how seem there is a pendulum back and 01 OLIVER MESSIAEN AMEN DE LA CRÉATION sic was not a going concern for the B.C. Was it really that depressing? those things get distorted in one's forth from the folk tradition to the Georgia-native best known as lead S.O. No. But the last 20 minutes or mind. I developed a concept of avant-garde. (PERFORMED singer-songwriter and guitarist of so were rather head-scrambling. where the mix was going to end up acclaimed alternative rock band B.C. It was actually quite disturb- early on in that process as I knew I S.O. Indeed. But all the tracks still BY PETER SERKIN AND Deerhunter; currently comprised ing to make, that mix. I had to have wanted to open with ‘Amen De La feel quite raw, emotionally febrile. of fellow Atlanta-residents: Lockett a long quiet time afterwards as Création’ by Messiaen and essen- B.C. Well, I really have no style YUJI TAKAHASHI) Pundt, Moses Archuleta and Josh well. tially close with Xenakis, with the of music that interests me most. McKay, who released their seventh opposite of creation: destruction. Maybe at a certain time, I get very 02 PETE HARRIS RANGING BUFFALO studio album, Fading Frontier, last S.O. Did you make it in one long, into Messiaen and mystical, mod- year via their long-term label home, intense session? S.O. Let’s begin with that starting ern classicism, but what I look for (THE BUFFALO SKINNERS) the iconic 4AD. Only Cox, who in- B.C. Yes. I tend to only be able to point. in any music — whether it's pop- stigated the project, and Archule- focus that way, whether it's on my B.C. The Messiaen piece is the ular music on the radio or some- 03 VINCENT BELL TRAVELIN' GUITAR ta, remain of 2001’s original line up own music or a mix, or even when track on the mix that I've known thing from the 16th century — is a and the group’s sound has under- reading a book or watching a film. the longest. I bought it on vinyl, certain primitive quality; and prim- 04 ANNETTE PEACOCK THE OUTNESS QUEENS gone a slow-burn evolution as mu- I have a very poor attention span that version, at a church yard sale itive might seem patronising to the sicianship and songwriting nous and so I have to totally immerse when I was too young to be a re- composers, but what I mean is un- TRAVELLING THEME were honed and lives ran on, pitch- myself in things, not even to get up cord collector, but I was attracted adulterated. ing and re-stabilising (as all are to pee, in order to achieve the de- to its very striking cover: pink with 05 HARRY PARTCH THE LOST KID wont to do). sired effect — for better or worse. I strange, 70's science fiction ty- S.O. Honest? Yet what has remained con- mean, I named an album Monoma- pography. So the cover was a little B.C. Honesty and earnestness 06 CINDY LEE LAST TRAIN'S COME AND GONE sistent is the favouring of stream nia for a reason. frightening and when I put the re- tend to be misleading terms as a of consciousness songwriting, in- cord on in my parents' living room, lot of the time, it's people just act- 07 TOD DOCKSTADER TRAVELING MUSIC cluding lyrics, by Cox, whether for S.O. It is the most transportive I thought it was genuinely frighten- ing honest. But when a tape sim- Deerhunter — after which tracks frame of mind. ing. It’s atonal and spooky, but also ply starts rolling, or a composer is 08 EDWARD HAZELTON POOR BOY TRAVELING FROM are completed collaboratively by B.C. Totally, when I was given this very beautiful. It's a piece for two using stream of consciousness or the group and, of course, a produc- assignment, I found it very inter- pianists and most — including Mes- improvisational style, honesty is a TOWN TO TOWN er — or Atlas Sound, where some- esting, and also liberating as peo- siaen whose version you'd expect given. times even the producer is es- ple normally only want to talk when to be the greatest — approach it in 09 NIKOLAI RIMSKY-KORSAKOV THE WEST SINKS IN THE PALE chewed. On either project: texture it's mediated through commerce. a meditative way, whereas to me S.O. And Vincent Bell? trumps finesse, always. Another ‘Oh, you're promoting this.’ Well, I it should be as Yuji Takahashi and B.C. That’s sort of an oddity. He PINK DISTANCE omnipresent element complicit in don't have any new music to talk Peter Sirkin play it. Takahashi is a made an album of post-Les Paul accruing acolytes from their ear- about. This is about: I've created pianist from Japan who performed guitar overdubbing and guitar stu- (A. TOLSTOY) OP. 39, NO. 2 liest DIY shows through ever-larg- a mix, based on this concept and a lot of Xenakis’ piano works and dio wizardry, but it all has a dated er venues and top-billed festival it was a pleasure to do so. I found Messiaen’s and Toru Takemitsu’s feeling, which I kind of enjoy. It’s 10 BERNARD HERRMANN GHOST TOWN appearances around the world to it very affecting to listen to when it and other avant-garde compos- a good mood piece for the begin- this very day, is the ability to pique was done. It’s also unique as peo- ers’. He's very abstract and angu- ning of the journey when there's (DESERT SUITE) deep feeling, to craft transcendent ple usually just want me to com- lar in his playing, which I think is im- still some positive energy floating moments, sublimity through gui- pile obscure garage-rock records, portant to that piece in particular. around. 11 TWO GOSPEL KEYS I DON'T FEEL AT HOME tar lines (and ‘Desire Lines’). Still, whereas this mix is a focused pro- It's also about the creation of the the contrast between the snarling, ject that I invested time and crea- world and a good place to start a S.O. I found Annette Peacock, who IN THIS WORLD ANYMORE bleak undertone of much of 2013’s tivity into, as I would my own music, mix about atlases, maps and trav- follows, rather hard to fathom. Monomania, a nod to Cox’s tenden- to create something narrative. And el is with the making of that whole, B.C. I really enjoy her work, some- 12 DOC WATSON LOOK UP LOOK DOWN cy to vault into obsession, and last it's also a self-portrait of my frame with everything to follow. times more in concept than lis- year’s Fading Frontier, an LP redo- of mind as it’s music that I've been tening, but I find that song to be THAT LONESOME ROAD lent with residual peace, is some- listening to lately, particularly the S.O. Specifically the distinctly beautiful, simple and interest- what revelatory — yet we might do Xenakis piece, which I'm almost Southern, slightly eerie, sound of ing. It seems to be about trying to 13 DAPHNE ORAM THE OCEAN well to skip the personal. Today we certain will bother people, or they ‘Ranging Buffalo’. find something, almost like a song are convened to discuss ‘Traveling will think it's pretentious. But I sin- B.C. I find that piece to be haunt- that's a self-portrait of a song. 14 LEE HAZLEWOOD TROUBLE IS A LONESOME TOWN Music’, the Atlas-themed mix that cerely enjoy listening to these re- ing, but innocent. Its instrumenta- Cox has created for this issue. cords for the atmosphere they cre- tion is untrained and the voice is S.O. So you respond equally well 15 BO WEAVIL JACKSON HEAVEN IS MY VIEW The self-same mix arrived ate, similarly to ambient music, and rambling, almost like he's making it to conceptual tracks? To music across the Atlantic with Cox’s in- if that makes me pretentious then up as he goes along, and it has that that is primarily cerebrally rather 16 IANNIS XENAKIS LA LÉGENDE D'EER (EXCERPT) structions for careful listening, in I could have told you I was preten- optimism and nervous excitement than emotionally engaging? headphones, and also the disqui- tious already. I'm also not interest- about arriving in a new place, start- B.C. That song has been played 17 eting descriptor: ‘it is not enter- ed in music as a cute accessory to ing a new journey. You can hear it quite often in my kitchen late- taining. at all. it is definitely a mood a website, I've always found that re- in his voice, it's like he's remember- ly, which is where I listen to a lot 18 HASIL ADKINS MY HOME TOWN piece based on travelling and dis- pulsive. And I find it annoying with ing his first impression of this wild of music while doing chores. That location. it is pretty disturbing ac- digital media where frequently it landscape. The song is part of an whole LP is quite good. It's not easy tually. even making it has put me in seems that people are using mix- anthology of songs by black cow- listening, but once you get past its a weird mood. that Xenakis piece tapes and playlists as a new form of boys on the Texas frontier in the idiosyncratic nature, it's really wel- is truly evil.’ So, prior to our phone content modification. Still, anytime 1930s called: Deep River of Song: coming. It's like taking a hot bath, call, I shut blinds and settled in, you can get people to explore mu- Black Texicans, which is one of my as you get in it’s like ‘Argh!’, but duly daunted. The result was, well, sic, whether for commercial or oth- favourite musical items in my en- then your body adjusts. Then with we shall get to that — or perhaps er gain it's good — music is music. tire collection, every moment on it Harry Partch’s ‘Lost Kid’, the title is you already have. In any case, what is striking and stark. very evocative and he seems like follows is much of our conversation S.O. How did you begin to com- a lost person who found his way [ TRACK 17 IS LEFT INTENTIONALLY BLANK. ] delving in and around his selected pose this mix? Were there spe- S.O. And easy to connect to. through invention. A lot of his early tracks, whilst occasionally jetting cific Atlas-related concepts such B.C. Yeah, there’s absolutely no work was about being a hobo, be- off to discussing Atlas-related top- as mapping or migration that you pretence in that music. And what ing homeless and riding trains and ics such as globalisation, before wanted to explore? an educated listener (and I don't things of that nature, and he also inevitably winding up right back in B.C. After I had read [the concep- mean academically, just a person never seemed comfortable in the LISTEN TO THE MIX ON UNDERTHEINFLUENCEMAGAZINE.COM Atlanta, for as much as the mix can- tual brief] a few times, I felt it was interested in adventurous music) world of conventional instruments. not be extricated from its Southern easiest to step away to form my will hear when they listen to this He wasn’t satisfied with the tim-

282 283 bres that were available to him, and tening to him quite a bit and I think cism and I don't want to be a hypo- he's sitting on a porch with a load of that to me is a form of being lost. on MicroCastle, there's a less than crite. I have bourgeois tendencies standard singers and ‘Lonesome And finding a map to where he end- two-second sample of one of his as a traveller towards nice hotels, Road’ is a very standard song. ed up, that requires a lot of travel- works used for textural purposes. going out, shopping; towards crea- It's been recorded by everyone ling and thinking. ture comforts, which I despise in from Billie Holiday to Peggy Lee. I S.O. It was interesting to hear the theory and find embarrassing, but wouldn't be surprised if Frank Si- S.O. So he was a musical pioneer? harmonica come in on the Edward when you're travelling become natra sang it and I have a record- B.C. Yeah and when I was young- Hazleton track. necessary. Still, a lot of people ing of prison labourers singing it a er I found his work fairly impene- B.C. Yeah. It’s from a 60’s compi- don't have the money in their pock- cappella too. I’ve been performing trable. I didn't understand that it lation called One String Blues. It was et to get dinner and so to be going a cover of this Doc Watson version, was theatre, as I was listening for common back then to find older into these record stores and throw- having removed the vocal, manipu- a self-contained piece of music, musicians that had that tradition- ing around money… And it all be- lated the violin and just sung over which isn't really the context to lis- al, ‘authentic’ sound and re-record comes a blur as you find the Peru- it on the last couple of Atlas Sound ten to it in. them for the folk market, but some- vian vocal music in the Norwegian tours as a departure from the elec- thing went terribly wrong when record store, next to the artisanal tronic elements in the rest of the S.O. Did you perhaps need to be they found this guy as he was on a candle shop. I'm shocked at what's set. As I said, I’m very drawn to the more settled as a person in order to dark trip. When he first starts play- going on in Shoreditch, I remem- human voice with just one instru- be open to more disorienting mu- ing harmonica, I remember think- ber it being much different and the ment of late, and this violin is al- sic? ing he was this generic blues man, last time I was there, it was just like most dissonant, almost modernist. B.C. I’m sure there's a biological but then it gets very stark and real, Brooklyn, just like Saint Germain It’s not far from Penderecki or some explanation. For example, if you're and he lets out some screams that in Paris, just like Shibuya in Tokyo, of the more dissonant compos- too preoccupied you won't be pay- seem to foreshadow Alan Vega and just like various neighbourhoods in ers, and when bringing the Daph- ing attention to what you're hear- Suicide. I've always enjoyed that Berlin. There's a uniformity spread- ne Oram piece in about half way ing, but if your mind is occupied by song. ing that is disguised as this unique, through [the mix], I found that it just a specific percentage, say 13%, by artisanal lifestyle. fit. A bizarre accident that results a menial task, then that's the opti- S.O. Another tormented, lost soul. in this earth-bound singer sing- mum time to listen to music. One of B.C. Yeah, that's what it felt like. S.O. The spread of homogenised ing of human emotions drifting off my favourite things to do — and this And of course, I'm constantly read- city culture. into this radiophonic atmosphere is going to reveal me for the geek ing things like Faulkner, so it's im- B.C. The championing of a life- that becomes kind of cosmic. that I am — is to put on a record possible for me not to think of style of leisure and aesthetic con- and listen to it as I clean and cata- themes from a Southern Gothic templation, which so few people S.O. And then we return to earth logue other records. It's hard to sit perspective (although I hate saying can afford but so many people as- for Lee Hazlewood. and listen to a difficult piece of mu- it). It's hard for me to think about pire to. B.C. Who speaks for himself, al- sic, but if there’s some diffuser of any theme in that sort of Monocle S.O. Well, your next track is dis- ways. Whereas I can't tell you much activity then sometimes it sneaks magazine mentality of economic tinctly of its own place, so very about Bo Weavil Jackson’s life. He up on you and that's what I need to and anthropological analysis. For Russian, even in its title: ‘The West was obviously a religious man and happen nine times out of 10. Music me, the question is always, ‘What Sinks in the Pale Pink Distance.’ weary of his past and while there’s has to sneak up on me. Were you fa- is the personal story? What is the Have you been acquainted with op- a similar innocence to the Texan miliar with Cindy Lee? humanist angle?’ And wherever era for a long time? song here, it seems that this inno- there's a humanist angle, there's B.C. At school, I was a delinquent cence is newly acquired, perhaps S.O. No. always going to be darkness. (as you can imagine), a terrible stu- through contrition for a past deed. B.C. Out of curiosity when would dent, constantly disrupting class, And then he's slowly joined by his you assume that piece of music S.O. Of course. And as you were so I was constantly being sent to contemporary Mr. Xenakis. was made if you had to guess? saying, home must be forsaken in detention and what they'd do is order to travel. put the badly behaved children in S.O. Which is where my notes tail S.O. I’m not sure, perhaps the B.C. Yes, but the bourgeois class- a room where they'd have us do our off into a litany of horrors. How did 1940s. es are really the only people that assignments while they played op- you come to be acquainted with the B.C. I find that amazing. And that's hang onto homes in the traditional era and classical music. I remem- piece that this excerpt is cut from? sort of the response I have to it. It’s sense of homesteads, plantations, ber listening to Tristan and Isolde B.C. Xenakis is not obscure for the new project of Patrick Flegel, kingdoms or castles. The working and Faust and I found that it always a certain audience. He was very formerly of the band Women, and class have always been transient. put me in a calm and meditative much at the vanguard of electronic he is absolutely blowing my mind. state, as I was very hyperactive. and tape music and then he moved He's doing a lot of shows in drag, S.O. And musicians are perhaps So as I got older, I would use opera, into orchestral and chamber works. performing as this character Cindy the most transient profession of and music of that nature, as a sort When you investigate this area, or Lee and making incredibly haunted all. of tranquilliser and then as I got genre, of music you'll find a lot of songs — somewhere between Jean B.C. Oh my gosh. Part of my mood even older, bringing us up to now, I sameness, a lot of composers re- Genet and Bing Crosby, or Peggy when creating this mix was a cer- became a dilettante — a fan of cer- peating the same ideas, timbres, Lee. It’s the most interesting thing tain amount of depression and fa- tain eras of singers, and certain sounds and textures; and you will I've heard come out of anywhere in tigue associated with jet lag as I singers, mainly Italian ones from not find anyone nearly as potent as recent times. And it’s very at home just got back from Japan. I enjoyed the 1920s and 30s as I find there's Xenakis. He was absolutely a pre- on this mix. myself. I bought a lot of strange re- a lot of fragility there, especially in cursor of noise music, of punk. He cords and I like Japanese culture. the pieces where there is minimal explored the electronic domain in S.O. When I look at the notes I But I also enjoy the feeling that I voice accompaniment such as this a far more interesting way than, as made as I was listening, the next get of being displaced, a foreign- one. far as I'm concerned, anyone else, track has ‘Willy Wonka tunnel’ er, an alien. Then again, the great of any era. And ‘La Légende D’Eer' scribbled next to it, referencing the thing about America is that it con- S.O. By the time we reach Bernard is where to begin. It was written on part in the Gene Wilder film where tains ‘foreign’ lands; I can drive to Herrmann’s ‘Ghost Town' your trav- commission for the opening of the the children suffer through an on- Arkansas and not know where I am. eller really is lost. Pompidou Centre in Paris and com- slaught of scary visuals during a There's both beauty and ugliness B.C. Herrmann is a great com- posed for eight speakers. I mean, boat tour of the factory. in culture and nature here. Saying poser, a great conductor, and this it’s hard enough for the average lis- B.C. I like that you say that as I still that, Japan is a completely differ- song seems to evoke a forgotten tener to listen to it in headphones, have the same experience listening ent state of mind. town, an abandoned place. The so can you imagine all these sounds to these far out compositions as I landscape is becoming more al- coming from all directions at max- did when I was young and saw some S.O. How do lengthy tour cycles ien, menacing yet tranquil — until imum volume? With an incredibly weird movie. Tod Dockstader [who effect your state of mind? Xenakis creeps in and tranquility disorienting light show too (appar- wrote this track] made a lot of elec- B.C. The longer they go on, the goes out the fucking window. But ently). tronic music, both academic and more everything starts to blend to- we’ll get to that. And Doc Watson is avant-garde, as well as commer- gether and that's when I start to an interesting case. He was a tra- S.O. [shudders] cial music, but this was one of his feel negative and cynical and like ditional folk balladeer and this next B.C. The earliest thing Xenakis more serious pieces. When Deer- the whole world is just one glob- track is from a record called Doc was renowned for was working with hunter made Cryptograms, I was lis- al shopping mall. It’s not a criti- Watson and His Family. It sounds like Le Corbusier for the 1958 Brussels

284 285 World Fair where Varèse performed lonely, and the songs on that re- start seeing people subscribe to to me, is listening to Xenakis at his composition for Poème élec- cord purvey a loneliness that is certain aesthetic practices in plac- maximum volume — and I wouldn't tronique in this specially designed very hard to achieve artistically. es where they don't seem natural. recommend that to anyone else. building. Xenakis [who was also an It’s whatever clears your mind and architect] assisted Le Corbusier S.O. Let’s turn back to Xenakis. S.O. Such as street art popping up helps you to obtain a non-worldly and also designed a piece of music One of the sub-themes of this is- in the freshly fabricated shopping state. I’m just suspicious of a lot of that played as you entered and ex- sue is the Anthropocene, our nas- malls of Dubai? the options presented. I've always ited the building called ‘Concrete cent age, so called as humans have B.C. Right and at a certain point I found that the best way to find a PH’ which was purely the sound of now altered the planet significant- just have to stop thinking about it solution to what ails you is to get burning charcoal. Obviously a guy ly enough for a new geological era as it becomes difficult to work out really sick and then figure out what with some brutal ideas. ‘La Légen- to be designated. His track almost what is actually better: should cer- nature wants. What does your body de D’Eer' is a journey through a sounds like the hellish gateway into tain places remain unchanged? Or want? The problem is that society labyrinth, a hell, and so a lot of the it. is it better that everyone becomes as a whole is very polluted, not just sounds are meant to represent the B.C. There's always great art that more progressive yet shares the environmentally, but cognitively, creatures, demons and spectres surrounds a fin de siècle, after a same [monoculture]? The reality is and therefore it's difficult for our there. And in the context of this Belle Époque. that humanity cannot live togeth- minds to communicate what they mix, there has been optimism, mel- er in peace. They’ll invent religious need as our needs have also been ancholy, increasing tension and S.O. Well this is it. When you were or social or economic structures to commodified. So now, instead of a existential uncertainty and, now, talking about the last Deerhunter divide people into ‘you vs. me’, ‘us brain saying to a person, in simple one finds oneself in the depths of record, Fading Frontier, which was vs. them’. It’s grotesque, like a car- terms: I need silence, I need quiet. hell being screamed at in the face in part about our shared fading fu- toon. And American politics is so Now it’s: I need yoga, I need thera- by a banshee. But this is only a sec- ture, you were saying that you don't divisive. You have to be this and this py, I need drugs, I need beer, I need tion. And, if you want to know what even want to know what comes is what you're supposed to believe a joint, I need crack, I need pussy, I a fucking freak I am, I listen to the next, after now, further into the An- if you are this. Or ‘Oh you're not this? need cock, I need money, I need a whole thing quite regularly when- thropocene. Does that still stand? That means you're that.’ new car, I need to fill something; I ever I need a palate cleanser, or B.C. Quite strongly, yes. I don't need to fill all holes, plug them all feel like I'm finished with music. I want to sound like a luddite as I S.O. Well there’s a planetary up — when really I think it's proba- go into my listening room and listen certainly have used these things in dearth of subtlety on the rise it bly more necessary to just unplug to it on really high-end speakers at the past, but I just see the world be- seems. The grey space is being all the holes and air it all out. Open maximum volume. I just sit there coming more and more a spectacle erased. up the windows of the attic and air and let it wash over me for an hour, of digital information, of social me- B.C. It’s very much a competition, out the crawl space. and then I sit and listen to nothing dia: people on Instagram exercis- a ballet, a game. Cowboys and Indi- S.O. Go somewhere where the wil- for an hour. And I see that experi- ing brutal levels of narcissism and ans. derness is not signposted. ence in the same way as my yuppie being rewarded for it. It’s soulless. B.C. Yeah. I find society is just a neighbours do yoga. It really does That might seem like a silly thing to S.O. And how does Atlanta feel to- bunch of stagnant air right now empty your mind as it's terrifying complain about while children are day? and we really need some circula- the first time you hear it and then being slaughtered in Syria (as it's B.C. It feels like everywhere else. tion. you start thinking, ‘Well, is it so ter- being live streamed on Facebook) People are painting over old build- rifying?’ Maybe this demon can but the world as I see it has, in the ings, putting in antiquated light fix- S.O. Well, perhaps this mix will scream in my face and I can be un- past few years, irrevocably dam- tures and opening artisanal cheese assist. affected, and then you start to hear aged itself. shops: creating a playground for B.C. I doubt many will make it other things like the detail in the It's definitely an era when the rich. I'm not a hypocrite, I play through. And as a closing note, mixing. A lot of people would listen everything is very temporary. It’s on that playground. I buy the fuck- I don't ever make anything, not to it and say, ‘Jesus Christ, this is as if the fabric of culture has al- ing candles and shit. I'm no differ- least this mix, with the intention pretentious noise with no design. ways been an old piece of leather ent to anyone else. I'm not superior. of showing off obscure taste. I It’s just like 1000 china cabinets that's quite worn and for a while, in I don't live an austere life. wish that it could be as it is with- falling down 1000 stair cases.’ And the mid-20th century, when things out this context of it having ‘been I would say that those people have like Abstract Expressionism and S.O. But you're concerned about made’ by this person and ‘look at an underdeveloped sense of beau- jazz were happening, with people where this homogenisation will the music they make’. The music I ty. And they'd say: ‘You're a pre- like Coltrane and Pollock and mod- lead? make is never going to be a direct tentious twat,’ and I'd say, ‘Right ernist poets such as William Carlos B.C. I don't know that I'm con- translation of what influences me on.’ And at least, I'll be deaf soon Williams, Burroughs, Pound and cerned as much as weary. Concern as I'm not a Russian opera singer, enough to not hear them mock me. others drastically disregarding the implies one is trying to come up nor am I Xenakis. I’m influenced by past — that was when the leather with solutions. Weariness is more the atmospheres that these peo- S.O. Pretension gets a bad rap. was at its peak of patina, perfectly of a dry acceptance. I've got noth- ple create, but I have to create with B.C. If it weren't for pretentious- worn in, and now holes are appear- ing to offer, I've got no answers. my own language and I have to re- ness we'd have no good music. ing. That cultural fabric is no dif- If you want to know what I think member what that language is, Even the people that are making ferent to that of clothing, or a piece one must do to be happy… Disown and as time passes it's easy to for- popular music, and by that I mean of furniture upholstery, eventual- everything, take a vow of chastity get what language you speak. widely popular, the biggest music ly it becomes threadbare and cer- and sobriety, and meditate. I don't I'm very grateful for being celebrities there are, those who do tain people, or society as a whole, know. Obviously I can't bring myself able to talk about music and play really well, are (surprise, surprise) decides it's time to re-cover it — to do it (which makes me no better music for what I consider to be a extraordinarily fucking preten- it's time to throw the upholstery than anyone else), but when I read large audience — certainly larg- tious. Audiences want very much out and replace it with synthetic about certain types of progress, er than I ever anticipated — and I to receive pretentious art and then upholstery that won't ever get old I'm confounded. Certain aspects of never got anywhere by trying to discredit the pretentious crea- — so we begin a new cycle of cul- older traditions are despicable, but be something I'm not, or accom- tor, it goes way back. I mean, peo- tural development in which things as everything becomes sublimat- modating people. In other words: ple thought Mahler's Symphonies are designed to artificially sustain ed [into one way of living], I don't everyone, no matter what you do, were shocking, Schoenberg, and themselves or, by contrast, to make think humanity is any closer to hon- you have to know yourself and you now we listen to them on NPR driv- themselves obsolete. esty, or actualisation. have to know your story. You can't ing round in our Volvos. let your story determine its own S.O. Does travelling exacerbate S.O. You mentioned meditation. ending by being ‘the story’ – like [Track 17 is left intentionally blank.] that feeling? Do you practice transcendental I'm this so I've got to die at this age, B.C. Seeing these things play out meditation, or any other spiritual- tragically. You have to just let your S.O. I read the undertone of Hazel around the world, it confirms your ity-related pursuit? story tell itself, and you have to be Adkins ‘My Home Town’, your clos- suspicions. It confirms that there B.C. I think those are things that able to look honestly at yourself, er, as suicidal. is an aesthetic idea, an econom- need to be discovered in a person- in a non-narcissistic way, as in my B.C. He seems that way and from ic idea, an aspiration, that's being al way, and it’s easy to commod- opinion – great art is not self-ad- my knowledge of him, he was a hy- distributed through global means. ify them, to turn them into a so- monishment, or self-criticism, and peractive genius in some ways but Social media are a constant stream cial movement or a product. And I it’s also not praising oneself – it's he was also an outsider and very of aspirational material and so you guess transcendental meditation, just being as you are.

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