Posts in Indie Rock
Dave Davison, Maps & Atlases
Dave Davison, Maps & Atlases

Dave Davison doesn't really understand the label “math rock” that some people have given his band Maps and Atlases. Math rock the music, like mathematics the subject, after all, requires “coldness and calculation,” according to Davison. But the four members of Maps and Atlases met at Columbia College in Chicago—an art school.  Davison majored in cultural studies, Erin Elders and Chris Hainey were film majors, and Shiraz Dada majored in sound engineering. As a band, they’ve been called math rock because of their complex rhythmic structures and unconventional time signatures.  But with their debut release Perch Patchwork (Barsuk Records), they've written what critics have called a more accessible sound.  Regardless, Maps & Atlases plays some wonderfully unique and creative music.  But that's what you get when four guys from art school start a band. 

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Alternative, Indie, Indie Rock, Math Rock, Sargent House Records, Barsuk Records, Fat Cat RecordsBen Opiparibarsuk, dave davison, maps & atlases, maps and atlases, perch patchwork Comment
Rocky Votolato
Rocky Votolato

It might not be a stretch to say that writing saved the life of singer/songwriter Rocky Votolato.  After the release of his previous album The Brag & Cuss, Votolato suffered bouts of depression and anxiety so severe that he barely left his apartment for a year.  To overcome this, he did two things: he read and he wrote. 

What struck me most, as I talked to Votolato backstage before his show at the Black Cat in DC two weeks ago, was how writing, for him, was an act of survival.  While he wrote his latest album True Devotion (Barsuk Records) to appeal to his fans, of course, he found that he needed the album even more than they did.  Writing became an act of therapy for Votolato, who told me, "I used to see suicide as a viable option for existential suffering.  I used to think it was a fine choice, a justified choice." Votolato no longer feels that way, but those were dark times, made bright by the power of the written word.

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Alt Country, Folk, Indie, Indie Rock, Indie Folk, Barsuk RecordsBen Opiparibarsuk, interview, makers, rocky votolato, true devotion, waxwing Comment
Patrick Stickles, Titus Andronicus
Patrick Stickles, Titus Andronicus

There were only a few times during my talk with Patrick Stickles, singer and songwriter for Titus Andronicus, that our conversation felt like an interview.  Instead, it really felt more lit an upper-level lit seminar.  This is what we talked about: Camus, Faulkner, reader response literary theory, and whether a text has any inherent meaning.  The depth of our conversation reflects not just Stickles' concern with the songwriting process but the anxiety of being a writer and his concern with whether the audience (and by audience, I mean the people hearing or reading his words) understands his authorial intent. It takes Stickles months to finish a song, and indication of the care he takes to craft that message. The result is an album like The Monitor, a concept album loosely based on the Civil War and civil war: it's about both the historical event and Stickles' existential angst.

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Indie, Indie Rock, Punk, XL Records, Merge RecordsBen Opipariamy andronicus, amy klein, patrick stickles, the airing of grievances, the monitor, titus andronicus, xl recordingsComment
Wes Miles, Ra Ra Riot
Wes Miles, Ra Ra Riot

Remember all those physics majors in college who spent their time holed up in labs?  If they are anything like Wes Miles, the songwriter for Ra Ra Riot, they might very well be writing songs as well as working with spectrometers.  That's not to say that Miles (a physics major and 2006 graduate of Syracuse University) was writing music when he should have been working with mass and magnets; instead, it's pretty clear that being a physics major has made Miles a better songwriter.  This is not the first time a songwriter has told me that, as you'll read, and it's something that I find fascinating.  It's easy to see the link between, say, writing lyrics and reading literature, but I'm intrigued by the link between music and mathematics. 

So read my interview with Wes Miles of Ra Ra Riot.  You'll learn more about how being a physics major helps him as a songwriter, how many of his lyrics start as pure gibberish, and why he likes Wuthering Heights.

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Indie, Indie Rock, Arts + Crafts Records, Barsuk RecordsBen Opipariboy, physics, ra ra riot, syracuse, the orchard, too dramatic, wes milesComment
Hutch Harris, The Thermals
Hutch Harris, The Thermals

One of the things I always ask writers to do here is describe their ideal writing environment, where they would be the most productive.  Most mention someplace scenic, whether it’s the water, the woods, or high above a landscape looking down.  Whatever it is, it’s a place of beauty.

Then there’s Hutch Harris of The Thermals, the anti-hero of the picturesque writing environment.  Whatever is in front of him, it’s probably too much.  He doesn’t want the sea, the trees, a gazebo, or a bay window.  He wants nothing.  Just white walls.  Anything else is a distraction.  That’s why I told him that if he ever does time, he could write The Great American Novel.  Or if he ever becomes a monk, that would also work.

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Indie, Indie Rock, Kill Rock Stars Records, Punk, Saddle Creek Records, Sub Pop RecordsBen Opiparihutch harris, kill rock stars, killrockstars, personal life, the thermals, thermalsComment
Orenda Fink, Azure Ray
Orenda Fink, Azure Ray

If you are an Azure Ray fan, you can thank a psychic.  Not just any psychic, but a single online psychic back in the internet's infancy of the mid 1990s.  We don't know this person's name--we know it's a man, at least--but he told Orenda Fink to start writing songs as a method of catharsis to deal with some issues in her life.  This was during a time when she was writing what she calls "sugary pop," so it was quite a shock for someone to suggest this sea change in her songwriting themes.  But she listened to him, and you are reading this now.  And if he really is a psychic, he'll know about this interview and read it too.

The newly reformed Azure Ray, consisting of Fink and Maria Taylor, drops Drawing Down the Moon on Saddle Creek Records this month. 

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Indie, Indie Rock, Dream Pop, Saddle Creek RecordsBen Opipariazure ray, maria taylor, orenda fink, saddle creek, saddle creek records, saddlecreek, the faint, todd finkComment
Bethany Cosentino, Best Coast (2010)
Bethany Cosentino, Best Coast (2010)

Sure, Best Coast is bikini beach lo-fi pop, and Bethany Cosentino says that she doesn't think too much about her lyrics.  But she is a huge fan of David Foster Wallace, arguably one of the most influential and creative writers of the past twenty years, and that gives her instant street cred in the literary world.   

Best Coast is one of the hottest indie bands of the summer, and their album Crazy For You dropped at the end of July.  You can read any one of the endless interviews with Cosentino on the internet, but this may be the only one without a mention of her cat.  I chatted with Cosentino for a few minutes this week about California, creative non-fiction writing, David Foster Wallace, and how the weather affects her creative process.

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Alternative, Indie, Indie Pop, Indie Rock, Mexican Summer RecordsBen Opiparibest coast, besty coasty, bethany cosentino, bikini beach, bobb bruno, boyfriend, california, converse, crazy for you, mexican summer, snacksComment
Steve Bays, Hot Hot Heat
Steve Bays, Hot Hot Heat

Steve Bays, the singer and songwriter for Hot Hot Heat, grew up on the water, and he lives only feet from it now in Vancouver.  But don’t expect him to take his guitar down to the water’s edge on a whim and start strumming, like some free-spirited songwriter with his toes in the sand and the wind in his hair (even though Bays and I did discover that we both share a love of the great guitar strummin’ songwriter Jim Croce).  Like most professional writers, Bays needs structure to his writing process, and in that aspect he is unique among the songwriters I have talked to, who rely more on the inspiration of their muse.  In fact, if you didn’t know better, you might think Bays dutifully goes to his office every day to write.

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Alternative, Sub Pop Records, Post Punk, Indie, Indie RockBen Opipari21@12, bandages, dangerbird, dangerbird records, future breeds, hot hot heat, steve bays, tugboat placeComment
Stuart McLamb, The Love Language
Stuart McLamb, The Love Language

If you are expecting Stu McLamb, leader of The Love Language, to talk about all the drama that led up to his first album—you know, the breakup—you won’t find it here.  After the endless internet fixation on it last year, neither of us had any interest in revisiting that topic.  What we did talk about was how McLamb writes. And that’s an overlooked topic—but one that should be discussed, because the man can write a great melody. 

The Love Language’s new release is Libraries(Merge Records).   McLamb talks about the new release having a “beach vibe.”  We talked on the phone before the band was about to begin their tour in support of Libraries.  I was impressed by the focus with which he approaches the melody side of the writing process.  With McLamb, the melody always comes first, in two ways.  One, it’s the first thing he writes.  And two, it’s the most important part of the song.  To say he is meticulous in the crafting of his melodies would be an understatement.   In his own words, he “obsesses” over them.  

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Indie, Indie Rock, Merge RecordsBen Opiparilibraries, merge records, stuart mclamb, the love languageComment
Adam Turla, Murder By Death (2010)
Adam Turla, Murder By Death (2010)

We'll get the obvious out of the way.  Murder by Death is not a metal band. Not even close. In the words of songwriter/singer/guitarist Adam Turla, it's "a rock and roll band with a little bit of country.  There’s a cello, a guy with a low voice, and some piano.  It’s music that can exist at any time. And we tell great stories.”

There you have it.  Murder By Death—named after the 1976 Neil Simon movie—is a rock n’ roll band.  And a damn good one. Turla and his bandmates met at Indiana University.  A religious studies and English major, Turla has been obsessed with the craft of writing since his college days, when he started writing poetry.  A self-professed lover of the classics, Turla can dish about everyone from Hemingway to Gabriel Garcia Marquez with the best of ‘em.

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Bloodshot Records, Vagrant Records, Indie, Indie Folk, Indie RockBen Opipariadam turla, bloomington, cello, dagan thogerson, matt armstrong, mbd, murder by death, sarah balliet, turla, vagrant, vagrant recordsComment