The Cactus Blossoms on One Day, their musical roots, Jenny Lewis, and what it was like to work with David Lynch on the set of 2017’s Twin Peaks: The Return.
Category: The AD Interview
Destroyer :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Daniel Bejar has been making oblique, urbane pop symphonies as Destroyer for 13 albums and nearly three decades now, but Labyrinthitis is among his best. It pulses with dance rhythms, bristles with literate asides, unspools a hypnotic stream of film-like imagery, hazards a long, rap-inspired spoken word interval, and, once or twice, rocks unabashedly. It’s the kind of album, you can get lost in—or perhaps a little dizzy from. You don’t know quite what’s happening from moment to moment, but there’s a swirl and a sweep and an urgency to it that propels you ever forward.
Stan Batcow :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Few people take the concept “create your own culture” to the extent of pStan Batcow. Since the launch of his label Pumf (Parsnips Under My Feet) in 1984, the musician, visual artist, and zine publisher from Blackpool, England has burrowed down into an unfathomably deep rabbit hole.
In a rare interview, Batcow shares the story of the label’s origins, describes some of their very strangest releases, and explains his obsession with the number seven.
Superchunk :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
For more than 30 years, Superchunk has made its wild, tuneful racket, hitching blistering guitar mayhem to graceful pop melodies. The band took a break in the aughts but has since caught a second wind, cranking out rollicking records that are imbued with wisdom.
Michael Hurley :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
With a career that stretches back to his 1964 glistening debut on Folkways, Michael Hurley has continued to churn out wholly singular albums of interstellar country blues, scattered across decades and labels. Released in December just prior to his 80th birthday, his latest The Time Of The Foxgloves finds a reinvigorated Hurley in a studio for the first time in a while. We recently had a lengthy phone call with Hurley to discuss his new album, the pleasures of listening to the CBC, inspiration and collaboration, what he learned from listening to Duke Ellington, the book he’s working on, and more.
Cate Le Bon :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Now at Aquarium Drunkard, we catch up with Cate Le Bon to discuss her new album, Pompeii, the COVID pandemic, the Tim Presley painting that came to embody her record but which she couldn’t bear to put on the cover, and the way that the artistic process remains instinctual and mysterious, even to Le Bon herself.
Nora Guthrie :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Nora Guthrie joins us for a rambling conversation just after Thanksgiving about Woody Guthrie: Songs and Art, Words and Wisdom, the current that carries Woody’s work forward, and the power of being impulsive for a good cause.
Jake Xerxes Fussell :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
For his fourth and latest album, Good and Green Again, Fussell worked with James Elkington to bring rich, subtle shadings to these reconstructed songs, achieving a melancholy clarity and modern-day resonance in music first conceived centuries ago. We spoke earlier this year about how he finds personal meaning in old songs, why he respects but doesn’t emulate the note-for-note recreators, and how the way you hear traditional music can change as you change over time.
Julie Doiron :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
I Thought Of You marks Julie Doiron’s first official solo release in nine years. Throughout our conversation, Doiron explains what guides her collaborations and projects.
William Parker :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Music flows out of bassist, composer and bandleader William Parker like a river. There are few musical formations that the artist has not tried. From solo, to duo, to trio, to small ensembles, to large ensembles, Parker is constantly moving, evolving and changing, following the flow of the music. While Parker, who turns 70 on January 10, 2022, has recorded and performed with some legendary musicians (e.g. Cecil Taylor, Don Cherry, Peter Brötzmann) his own voluminous discography, and his manifold compositions, will be his lasting legacy.
Jennifer Castle :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Late last month, on the Winter Solstice, Jennifer Castle re-released a live recording from the Music Gallery in Toronto from 2006, the first recorded output of her now treasured career, and a document harkening back to the early days of when she recorded under the name Castlemusic and played with a wild and rambling sense of discovery and abandon, allowing the spirit of her own poetry to lead her fingers on guitar.
We recently caught up with Castle to discuss the re-release, her musical origins, the omnipresence of the personified world in her music, her connection between singing and water, the urge to wander, and where she goes from here.
Nils Lofgren :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
The latest Neil Young & Crazy Horse record, Barn, was indeed recorded in a barn, high in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains. Mostly captured live, it’s the band at its most elemental and warm, the sound of four old friends who still love making a racket together. Aquarium Drunkard hopped on Zoom with Lofgren recently to get his insight into what makes Young and the Horse tick, even after all these years.
Emil Amos :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
We recently caught up with Emil Amos to discuss Neil Young, Wu Tang, the upcoming season of Drifter’s Sympathy, the vinyl manufacturing crises and the shadowy history of his father’s friendship with David Crosby.
Hand Habits :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Meg Duffy talks about their process, the liberating effect of working with an out queer artist like Perfume Genius and the way that the meanings of songs shift over time. “One of my favorite things about making records is that I learn about what the meaning is, later, after it’s out,” they confide.
Phil Cook :: Finding The Purity In Music
We catch up with Phil Cook on the eve of the release of his beautiful new instrumental record, All These Years. Through an unwavering smile, he talked about the importance of a fertile cultural landscape, how the label he just started is anything but, and why he decided to release a solo piano album now.