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Interview: Deerhoof (Pt. 2)
Interview: Deerhoof (Pt. 2)
- Genre : More Music
- Type: News
- Author : Super Admin
- Date : Thu, 02 Oct 2008
I know that you haven't had formal guitar training, so how do you approach improv and writing parts for the record? Is it emotion, texture or just what is sonically pleasing?
That's a good question. Probably the answer is somewhat physiological, you know? I don't remember who said it, but somebody told me once that every musician essentially only writes one song, so it'd better good. In a way I agree and in a way I disagree. I think that obviously imagination has the ability to give us things that we don't understand, and I think the trick it trying to then do something with that. You know what I mean? An attempt to bring that into the world. As far as my creative process and how I write or how I play, basically I don't understand what I'm doing. I don't come at it from a place of knowing, and I don't know any creative person that does. There may be people who have all kinds of musical training and musical theory, but ultimately the act of creating should be a step into the unknown. I'm not saying that I'm right, I'm just saying that this is my perspective. Even if it is guided by extremely rigid theoretical principles, ultimately the goal is something that you can't reach without going through some process.
There are all kinds of different aspects to music that I really enjoy: I enjoy playing music, I enjoy interacting with people and traveling, but ultimately the thing that really is the magical thing and the mysterious thing is why do you gravitate towards playing this chord instead of those other chords? Which brings me back to the idea of this maybe being physiological, and maybe literally it is the way these sounds resonate within my body. I hear them, and I don't know why when it's wrong it doesn't feel right. It's not like I would hate this other chord or something, but when it gets to the right chord, then I know.
For myself, I'll say that I require a lot of solitude when I'm working on music because it's hard to hear your own voice sometimes. It's hard to understand what it is that you have created and what it's trying to tell you. I'll leave it at that. I've just really learned that it's not always there screaming at me, I have to be very careful and listen very hard. I think it's interesting because ultimately when you look at it that way, it has the same flavor as a whim. You know, what ultimately becomes musical—not style, but musical decision-making or musical ideas—it feels like a whim. They both come from somewhere inside the body or in the mind, and they tell you to do something, or they tell you when something is right. I'm kind of stretching myself here, but basically I was thinking that you don't know the results, so it's sometimes confusing. Like, is this musical decision actually something necessary for me or is just some part of the back of my mind saying that this is what I should do?
As a band, it seems like it would be incredibly difficult to bring together your objective viewpoints and whims to create something as intricate and cohesive as your music.
Dude, that's the thing. That's the hardest thing possible. That's the part that drives bands to break up and drive each other insane. It's very difficult to do. It's trying to figure out a way to interface all these different imaginations, but no one really understands their own, much less anyone else's. When you think about it, it really is completely impossible, and all we can do is stopgap measures to make it work all the time. There's no one method that could ever work because the imagination is constantly coming up with new problems.
Even with all these different imaginations creating such different sounds on each album, there's always something undeniably "Deerhoof" about your music. Do you feel like there is a core to you guys as a band that connects everything?
I think, in a way the answer is yes, and the core is our limitations as musicians. Basically, the instruments that we play and what we tend to play on them. Maybe what remains is that residue of the aspect of
That's a good question. Probably the answer is somewhat physiological, you know? I don't remember who said it, but somebody told me once that every musician essentially only writes one song, so it'd better good. In a way I agree and in a way I disagree. I think that obviously imagination has the ability to give us things that we don't understand, and I think the trick it trying to then do something with that. You know what I mean? An attempt to bring that into the world. As far as my creative process and how I write or how I play, basically I don't understand what I'm doing. I don't come at it from a place of knowing, and I don't know any creative person that does. There may be people who have all kinds of musical training and musical theory, but ultimately the act of creating should be a step into the unknown. I'm not saying that I'm right, I'm just saying that this is my perspective. Even if it is guided by extremely rigid theoretical principles, ultimately the goal is something that you can't reach without going through some process.
There are all kinds of different aspects to music that I really enjoy: I enjoy playing music, I enjoy interacting with people and traveling, but ultimately the thing that really is the magical thing and the mysterious thing is why do you gravitate towards playing this chord instead of those other chords? Which brings me back to the idea of this maybe being physiological, and maybe literally it is the way these sounds resonate within my body. I hear them, and I don't know why when it's wrong it doesn't feel right. It's not like I would hate this other chord or something, but when it gets to the right chord, then I know.
For myself, I'll say that I require a lot of solitude when I'm working on music because it's hard to hear your own voice sometimes. It's hard to understand what it is that you have created and what it's trying to tell you. I'll leave it at that. I've just really learned that it's not always there screaming at me, I have to be very careful and listen very hard. I think it's interesting because ultimately when you look at it that way, it has the same flavor as a whim. You know, what ultimately becomes musical—not style, but musical decision-making or musical ideas—it feels like a whim. They both come from somewhere inside the body or in the mind, and they tell you to do something, or they tell you when something is right. I'm kind of stretching myself here, but basically I was thinking that you don't know the results, so it's sometimes confusing. Like, is this musical decision actually something necessary for me or is just some part of the back of my mind saying that this is what I should do?
As a band, it seems like it would be incredibly difficult to bring together your objective viewpoints and whims to create something as intricate and cohesive as your music.
Dude, that's the thing. That's the hardest thing possible. That's the part that drives bands to break up and drive each other insane. It's very difficult to do. It's trying to figure out a way to interface all these different imaginations, but no one really understands their own, much less anyone else's. When you think about it, it really is completely impossible, and all we can do is stopgap measures to make it work all the time. There's no one method that could ever work because the imagination is constantly coming up with new problems.
Even with all these different imaginations creating such different sounds on each album, there's always something undeniably "Deerhoof" about your music. Do you feel like there is a core to you guys as a band that connects everything?
I think, in a way the answer is yes, and the core is our limitations as musicians. Basically, the instruments that we play and what we tend to play on them. Maybe what remains is that residue of the aspect of
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