Mick Turner’s guitar playing is instantly recognizable. From his role as the binding agent in the seminal band Dirty Three to his numerous solo albums and now his latest group, the dreamy duo Mess Esque, there’s no other guitar player with Turner’s distinctive sense of rhythm and tone. His sound can be hesitant, composed, jagged, and ragged, yet consistently in command and always compelling. AD caught up with Turner about the artistic blind date that started Mess Esque, how he collaborates with lyricists, his approach for painting versus music, and more.
Category: The AD Interview
The Telepathy Is Evident :: Nels Cline on Consentrik Quartet & His Old CD Wallet
With his fourth album for Blue Note Records, guitarist Nels Cline introduces the Consentrik Quartet: Cline on guitar with saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock, bassist Chris Lightcap, and drummer Tom Rainey on drums. Gathering noir-ish soundscapes, agile jams, and what Cline dubs “abstract and floaty ballads,” Consentrik Quartet bristles with energetic currents. He joins us to discuss forming Concentrik Quartet, the influence of Jimmy Giuffre and Paul Bley, the unpredictability of Wilco, and the contents of his old CD wallet.
Richard Dawson Is Walking The Path :: On The End of the Middle
“I’m trying to convince people that I’m a wizard and she always helps,” Richard Dawson chuckles, over Zoom, acknowledging the presence of his adorable and aptly named cat Trouble, who has cozily curled herself around the crook of the songwriter’s neck, perfectly poised like a luxurious scarf. She mostly remains in that position while Dawson speaks about the various themes and influences that provided a strong foundation for his excellent eighth studio album, The End of The Middle.
James Brandon Lewis :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Saxophonist James Brandon Lewis joins us to discuss his riveting new album Apple Cores: “I just operate within my natural being…I’m the person who, the things that people have told me were wrong about my playing, I leaned into harder.”
All Faded Into Dust :: Patterson Hood on Exploding Trees & Airplane Screams
With the Drive-By Truckers, Patterson Hood examines the region he’s called home for most of his life, adding the much-needed edge of his liberal politics to the Southern rock genre. When he moved to Oregon, though, Hood began looking back on his Southern adolescence in a new lens, writing his most personal album yet, Exploding Trees & Airplane Screams. Ahead of his third solo release (his first in 13 years), we sat down with Hood, discussing Muscle Shoals, fiction writing, and Vic Chestnutt.
Roedelius :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Featuring 50 tracks from his vast recorded archives, 90 presents kosmische pioneer Roedelius at his most intimate. The result is a collection that feels as meditative as it does personal. “Everything came to me as a gift of the moment,” he explains, opening up about the genesis of his creative practice and how his songs function like prayers.
Ron Geesin :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
In the creative act, is the interaction with others or solitude in a private space more important? While in the past, genius was often described as a solitary artist, distant from society, today more importance is placed on the “creative ecosystem” from which they emerge. The story of Ron Geesin might help to rebalance the issue, highlighting both the collaborative phase and the more secluded one. But could his choice to follow his own path, away from the well-trodden routes, have worked against him in terms of critical reception?
Julie Beth Napolin :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
At its best, art develops its own associations as it moves through the world. With Only the Void Stands Between Us on Silver Current Records, Julie Beth Napolin delivers a singular debut, one that cuts new trail through the cosmic and the colloquial wilds while adding to the amorphous canon of psych-folk.
Grooves Outside The Academy: An Interview with Peter Gordon from Love of Life Orchestra (Part 2)
An almost Zelig-like figure whose life and career has seen him careen from postmodern rock and jittery Downtown dance music ensembles, to opera and theater pieces, orchestral works, contemporary DJ culture, and so much more, Peter Gordon is the type of multifaceted artist whose wide range of interests have made him something of a cornerstone of underground music culture in New York City for well over four decades now. Even if few people outside of New York know who he is. And even there he’s not a household name. But that hasn’t stopped him from casting a wide net of influence over present-day sonic exploration, in all of its various forms.
Grooves Outside The Academy: An Interview with Peter Gordon from Love of Life Orchestra (Part 1)
An almost Zelig-like figure whose life and career has seen him careen from postmodern rock and jittery Downtown dance music ensembles, to opera and theater pieces, orchestral works, contemporary DJ culture, and so much more, Peter Gordon is the type of multifaceted artist whose wide range of interests have made him something of a cornerstone of underground music culture in New York City for well over four decades now. Even if few people outside of New York know who he is. And even there he’s not a household name. But that hasn’t stopped him from casting a wide net of influence over present-day sonic exploration, in all of its various forms.
Ralph Towner :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
As a member of the pioneering chamber/world/GORP jazz group Oregon, as a solo artist and leader or co-leader, guitarist/multi-instrumentalist/composer Ralph Towner has been making wide-ranging, pigeonhole-defying music for more than half a century. Speaking to Aquarium Drunkard from his home in Rome, Towner was happy to look back at a few of the many highlights of his remarkable and varied career, from including but not limited to all-night concerts in the ‘70s, an impromptu jam session with Sonny Rollins, his jazz-snob regrets, kicking Bill Evans off the piano, looking for a sex-free crash tent at Woodstock, meeting astronauts and the vicissitudes of selenography. Most importantly, he showed that, nearing his 85th birthday, his musical mind is as restless and active as ever, even if there’s still one instrument he’ll never, ever play.
Sam Wilkes :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Jazz in Los Angeles is blooming right now. Thanks in part to concert promoters like Yousef Hilmy of Minaret Records, people across the city are hearing a wide range of improvisational music styles in bars, stores, churches, and gardens that now moonlight as jazz venues. Sam Wilkes, a bass player, composer, arranger, and bandleader, is one of the most sought-after musicians in that scene.
Dylan Tupper Rupert & Jessica Hopper on Groupies :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
It opens with an abduction—and only gets crazier from there. Groupies is the latest series from KCRW’s Lost Notes music podcast. Written and hosted by Dylan Tupper Rupert and producer Jessica Hopper, the show’s eight episodes span the end of the ’60s, the birth of the ’70s Sunset Strip culture, and the dawn of punk rock, illuminating the lives of women often written out of the story or viewed as mere accessories to their rock star companions.
Jeff Parker on ETA :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
“With the ETA band, there were all these other experiences dealing with music that people were composing. So, when we would improvise, all of that other stuff was informed in what we were doing.” Visionary guitarist Jeff Parker joins us to discuss The Way Out of Easy, recorded live at his residency at ETA.
Bob Holmes (SUSS, numün, Ambient Country) :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
One of the ambient country scene’s biggest proponents for almost a decade now has been Bob Holmes, whose work with SUSS, numün and the Ambient Country podcast — among many other efforts — have spread the gospel far and wide. Holmes’ latest project is Across The Horizon, a collaboration with Northern Spy Records that brings onboard various like-minded artists drawn “from the wide landscape of instrumental music” (including Luke Schneider, Marisa Anderson, William Tyler and more) to curate a series of digital releases that will culminate next year in a double LP compilation of stellar sonic explorations.