A singer-songwriter as acclaimed for his art career, Terry Allen has always done things his own way. From his blood-soaked travelogue debut Juarez, to sculptures that reside in airports, he’s devoted his life to staggering bodies of work that move effortlessly between gallery walls, theatrical stages, and public airwaves. And that’s barely scratching the surface…
Category: The AD Interview
Sharon Van Etten :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Sharon Van Etten’s sixth full-length, We’ve Been Going About This All Wrong, is, like much of the music being released this year, a pandemic album, reflecting a long, contemplative couple of years that Van Etten spent in Los Angeles with her family. But even during lockdown, she wasn’t alone. Band members and fellow musicians reached out to her. Collaboration flourished.
Return To Hot Chicken :: James McNew Reveals The Secrets Of Yo La Tengo’s I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One
If you had to pick one album that encompasses the awesomely eclectic nature of Yo La Tengo’s vision, 1997’s I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One is your best bet. It’s got it all (almost), careening from crunchy noise-pop to spacey ambient, from free-form experimentalism to delicate balladry, from homespun electronica to blown-out Beach Boys covers. Somehow, the band fits all these puzzle pieces together, creating a masterful whole. The double LP’s closer aside, this isn’t a little corner of the world, it’s an entire galaxy.
Lyle Lovett :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
It’s been a decade since the last time Lyle Lovett released a new album, and 12th of June works as both an introduction as much as it does to catch up on the ten years passed. “I wanted this to be a proper introduction to me and the Large Band if people haven’t heard us, or just something that feels familiar to people that do.”
Sagittaire :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Lovely Music chronicles the early days of Ivan Mairesse’s Sagittaire project, pulling from material written between 2015 and 2017 in San Francisco, where Mairesse recorded the album before moving back to his hometown of Los Angeles. Mairesse takes an introspective approach to songwriting on Lovely Music, juxtaposing dark lyrics with lush pop arrangements, Fripp & Eno-esque guitar tones, and a tender vocal delivery.
Richard Thompson :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Music From Grizzly Man, is full of similarly stunning moments. The music Richard Thompson and his collaborators conjured up was the perfect accompaniment to Werner Herzog’s documentary about the ill-fated environmentalist Timothy Treadwell. But — like Neil Young’s Dead Man or Bruce Langhorne’s Hired Hand — it stands up just fine on its own.
Pink Mountaintops :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
Next month sees the release of the fifth Pink Mountaintops full-length, Peacock Pools — an eclectic, ruminative album, that reflects Stephen McBean’s long fascination with punk rock, his newer interest in free jazz and the creative ferment that can happen when talented people have time and space to experiment. “I really like this group of songs as far as an album, even though the songs are all over the place. For some reason, in my heart, it feels very cohesive.”
Big Thief’s James Krivchenia on Blood Karaoke, Mega Bog, and His Wide-Frame Techno-Thriller Americana Computer Music
We caught up with Krivchenia to discuss his new work as a producer, early drumming moments, and his computer music process over the phone from his new home in Los Angeles.
The Cactus Blossoms :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview
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.
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.