Between Writers
Kreg Viesselman & Myshkin - Part 2

Both Myshkin and Kreg Viesselman are songwriters who we have admired for a long time, and we are very lucky to be working with them in the UK. A Norwegian domiciled Minnesotan, Kreg's last album 'The Pull' was probably our most played record of 2006-7, and the writing simply blew us away when we heard it. Myshkin has the opposite heritage, born in Europe and raised in the USA, and has been on our radar since her time touring with Mike West (producer of Kirsty McGee's The Kansas Sessions album), and her voice is an elemental force to be reckoned with. Both artists are working on long-awaited new albums and will be touring the UK this year.
We are lucky to consider them our friends, but we felt it was time we introduced them to each other. We put them in touch, they swapped songs, and they organised a two-way interview for this week's 'between writers' series.

Between Writers #2b - Kreg Viesselman interviews Myshkin

K: How does your life in Art relate to the rest of your life? Does it help the various facets of your life agree, or are they difficult to reconcile?

M: I think i’ve managed to make my art and life intertwine, to a sometimes ridiculous extent. I tend to chase extremes, and seem to be at my most productive when the ‘various facets of my life’ are actually all focused in the same place. I’m still not sure if this makes sense as a way of living, it can be rather damn dramatic.

K: Has songwriting affected your own development, as a person, in any ways in upon which you would be willing to elaborate?

M: I’ve always been good at entertaining myself, I'm glad to have found a way to do that that other folks seem to appreciate too. When I’m not writing enough I feel like I’m skimming on the surface of life too much, so I guess it helps me go deeper, which hopefully aids some personal evolution.

K: To my ear, your songs bear the mark of effort, meaning: It appears that you put a lot of work into each of your song’s various layers - the music, the lyrics, and arrangements (the cast of musicians on your myspace page reads like movie credits). My question is: How do you know when a song is finished?

M: A song is never finished! That’s one thing that’s so beautiful about music as a medium, no? I don’t usually feel the need to re-record songs once they are released, but they definitely keep changing in performance. Of course you can get carried away seeking perfection in the studio, possibly why i’ve been working on the latest record so long.

K: How do you feel about revisiting a song you may have never really gotten ‘quite right’, even though it has already been released?

M: There’s one whole record I’d like to re-record, but I think I might get bored half way through if I tried.

K: Can you tell a ‘good’ song from a ‘not-as-good’ song (speaking of your own, of course. I defy the notion that one can have ‘good taste in music’)?

M: Not at first so much, but over time, if a song fails to ever hit that sweet spot again, it’s not a keeper. Maybe it could have been a good song but it just never found it’s way. The real special ones, though, I think I recognize as good while they are coming out.

K: Do your personal favourite songs usually turn out to be the audience’s as well? In other words, do you find that the songs that you enjoy playing the most end up being generally the most well-received? 

M: Usually there is some congruity, not always.

K: Do you tend to release (or at least perform) every song you complete, do a lot of ‘winnowing’?

M: Release no, there’s many unreleased songs hiding in the recesses of my mind, most of which I will never remember. Perform usually. Almost every completed tune makes it out of the house for at least one or two nights on the town.

K: I first heard your voice on a compilation called ‘Hold me up to the Light: the Songs of Peter Wilde’ to which we both contributed. Many of the artists were from the Pacific North West, where Pete is/was also based, Listening to those songs, I often pictured this thriving singer-songwriter scene in the upper left corner of the U.S. with Portland as it’s hub. I have always found that image attractive. If I had ever gone ahead and moved there, would I have found it to be so?

M: Hmmm. Well I think it was kind of like that, but by the time I moved there in 2002 it was a great big indie rock party, a new band moving to town every day, which IS singer-songwriter music actually, but people don’t call it that, and a divide is set up. I found it disappointing really, after musically coming of age in New Orleans, where the barriers between genres are surprisingly low as far as the scene and the interactions between everyone involved in music is concerned. Portland is really a wonderful city bursting with creativity, I just didn’t (with a few big exceptions) find a lot of musical family there, so that’s just my take.

K: Many of your lyrics deal with physical movement and/or geography (including songs like ‘Bojador’ that reference rather obscure and tantalizing locales with notoriously dangerous navigational conditions). Likewise, the music in a sort of quietly hectic way, helps to complete a spell, or an illusion of movement, if I can call it that. Have you found it difficult (or even tried) to write those types of songs now that you appear to be fairly rooted in one patch, what with your new dwelling?

M: 'Bojador' is written about a historical moment – the meeting of Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa, the incongruous South American horns were kind of a happy accident of the studio… but anyway, I do tend to get into musings of both history and geography, whether on or off the road. And being some kind of hopeless romantic, I like to write about where I am not. So I don’t think it’s gonna be an issue. Actually the one big musical breakthrough I feel like i’ve had come out of these two years off the road while I built my studio, is rhythmic: some kind of way to feel a groove i’ve never gotten before, that’s all about movement. Funny that.

K: Similarily, in what ways do you find that your physical surroundings play upon your art? You posed the question to me: ‘what is your favourite place on Earth’, and I will return the question to you with a slightly different spin: Have you found a place where the songs come more freely (on Earth or otherwise)?

M: I write when I need to, I think, no matter where I am. There’s places I feel like I can sing louder than others. New Orleans is one. Southern Oregon is another. I too love the adventure of new, unexpected, unaimed for places, and am still addicted to travel.

K: From what I can gather, you must be a person with a great deal of creative energy. Having just built your own cob house and possessing a quiver full of well-wrought albums, what else do you feel compelled to create? Furthermore, does one interest or creative effort tend to supplant others; to ‘scratch the itch’, as it were? Or is there no competition for your attention between your creative sides whatsoever?

M: An art-farm! There are unending projects here on this piece of mountain land where I live with a handful of fine friends: gardens and building oh my, but my big dream is to create a space for artists of all types to come find the peace, space and time to do their own and collaborative work. Oh, and more records and more tours! I do have a plan for a five piece touring band I hope to manifest someday.
It has really been interesting taking these two years off music to start this idea rolling and build this lovely little earthen dwelling. Definitely for the first six months, it took all my energy, creative and otherwise, I hardly picked up a guitar once I started building, and I didn’t really miss it. Then I started playing again, and now I’m just itchy to be done, to be able to set up my studio again and remember what it’s like to be a full time musician. Almost there!

K: What do you look for in - or is there any common thread you notice between - the songs, writers, and artists that you find yourself drawn to?

M: Heart driven intelligence? Willingness to find one’s own voice? That’s pretty vague, but seems accurate.

K: At many points in American History, there have been ‘Great Causes’ to which various artists and musicians have been attached (whether they wanted to be or not). It seems to me that although there is certainly no lack of ‘Causes’ at the present moment, there seems to be a disconnect between the public at large, the ‘Causes’, and Art. Having begun to form my own half-baked speculations about this, I must wonder: Is it just me that thinks this way? Would you care to weigh in on this thought? I suppose I could be more specific, but I am interested to see how you would interpret my point here...

M: I think a certain cynicism has grown up around the idea of political art, perhaps because of the co-opting, buying-out, greenwashing, etc that the powers-that-be have gotten so good at. Maybe we are all just over saturated with information and exhortations. There are definitely artists in this country that continue to make work about justice peace and environmental sanity…it’s a strange moment for activists here, after battling the bush regime and it’s avalanche of evils for 8 years, we find ourselves dealing with this changing of the guard that doesn’t feel like much change…the wars continue.

My personal story around political art is that I have loved it fiercely since I was a kid, and have always tried to bring my view of the world into all my creative work - trying to bring love into political songs and politics into love songs, or really just make it all one. During the last decade writing very overtly political music seemed like the best thing I could do - but at a certain point I did find myself just exhausted from all this ‘pushing against’ energy. The last two years of literally building up something beautiful from the earth has been super healing, and I think I’m starting to write songs of a sort i’ve been aiming at for a while but unsure of how to accomplish: songs that build up instead of push against. This seems to be my next challenge as a political artist. ­­­­­­­­

Ten Questions for Last Harbour

Little Red Rabbit is an artists' collective record label based in Manchester but with tendrils that reach out across the UK. The roster stretches from the singer-songwriter folk-pop of Anna Kashfi and Samson & Delilah through to the psyche-post-rock of Fuzzy Lights via the sprawling collective Last Harbour.  It works on the basis that each release is an artwork with its own distinct identity, and that each artist takes control of how their work is presented and of the means by which it's made.
If you want to get a taste of Little Red Rabbit then 'Trace' (LRR017) is a good place to start.  It's a compilation that brings us up to date with all the album releases so far.  With new artwork by in-house designer K. Craig, it includes songs from the highly acclaimed new albums by Last Harbour and Anna Kashfi plus back catalogue music from Fuzzy Lights, Samson & Delilah, Lazarus Clamp, Kalbakken and Crazy Man Michael.

 

Little Red Rabbit Collective - Ten Questions for Last Harbour

Anna Kashfi and Last Harbour have released highly acclaimed new albums on Little Red Rabbit in early 2010. Both feature in the band a singer/lyricist who doesn't play an instrument, so we thought it'd be interesting to hear their take - they had the same questions and were given 30 minutes in an empty room in which to provide answers.

1. Why do you write?

I just found myself in a situation where that's what I said I'd do. I guess I'd always wanted to do it, but I never made any deliberate moves in that direction. But I found myself in that position and found that I enjoyed it and that I couldn't stop. An unconscious, definite decision.

2. What usually comes first: rhythm, melody, an image, a phrase... or something different?

An image usually. I never write lyrics before I hear the music. When I listen to music it evokes an image or images. From there I try to build a narrative, to communicate what it is that I saw.

3. What's the balance of fact and fiction in your writing?

Oh, I have problems with fact and fiction.

4. And how do you see the territory between the two?

In song writing, I see fact and fiction as tools to get a fundamental message across. A fictional scenario is nothing without some real emotions. Then it becomes a story. I've written about some things that I have personally experienced and some things which I haven't. But because what I write is usually character based, there is already a remove. It's all fact and none of it is true.

5. Describe something that triggered a recent lyric. [Anything from a complete song to a single phrase - you're welcome to quote the lyric if you like but you don't have to.]

Mount Analogue was taken from Rene Daumal's 'Mount Analogue - A Tale of Non-Euclidian & Symbolically Authentic Mountaineering Adventures', which is the story of the search for a mythical mountain which links Earth to the Divine. 'It's summit must be inaccessible, but it's base accessible to human beings as nature has made them. It must be unique and it must exist geographically. The gateway to the invisible must be visible.' It's a lot funnier than it sounds. I had an image a man digging through this mountain, trapped by it's weight and that became the basis for the lyrics.

6. Neither of you has an instrument when playing live. What does it feel like to hear the music around you?

I don't really know. I tend to get quite wrapped up in it all. Because we've been playing together for a while, it feels as though we're all pulling together. It just kind of makes sense.

 

7. Are you conscious of an effect you want your words to have on a listener?  Not necessarily 'all your words ever' - more, 'does it occur to you?'

Again, I find that it's about communicating an idea. I've always thought of it in the sense that the music is a painted landscape and the lyrics are a figure in that landscape, providing a way in or a viewpoint.  I want people to see what I saw in the music.

 

8. Thinking of a recent lyric you discarded [again, you don't have to quote it], why didn't you use it?

Oh, I've written the lyrics to whole songs, then discarded them. Just forget they ever happened. It's usually because they're just wrong. The mood or the tone, or the sentiment. And you tend to know when something just doesn't fit you right. I can't give you an example due to my Stalinist revising of history. They no longer exist. I've wiped them out.

9. The classic advice, right or wrong or in-between, in writing classes is to 'write what you know'.  Is that the more the beginning, the middle or the end?

Sorry, I can't quite understand the notion of 'writing what you know'.  That kind of advice or rule, I just don't see any relevance to in what I want to do. 'Write what you think,' or 'write what you want.' I understand. As long as you can justify it to yourself, in my opinion, it stands.

10. Finally, Leonard Cohen once said that, "You donít really want to say "the tree," you want to say "the sycamore."  What do you take from that?

I think that some words just say more than others.

 

Last Harbour's latest album, 'Volo' was released in February 2010.
The Little Red Rabbit compilation album 'Trace' is available to download free from www.littleredrabbit.co.uk

The Hobopop Playlist

To round of this week of artist generated-content on Spiral Earth, we're putting together an hour or so of music ourselves. Having waited until we'd got back all of the articles from the various artists who have contributed I'd like to think that in some way the music we've picked will relate to what you've been reading this week, although if it does it's purely through our trust in our subconscious...

Here's hoping you've enjoyed what we've gathered together to show you this week, and that perhaps you've discovered some new music, or some new insight into music you already knew you liked. We also hope that you enjoy the new Hobopop Releases that have emerged this week: Kirsty McGee's No.5 and the re-issue of Honeysuckle.

We'd like to thank the folks at Spiral Earth for the opportunity to take over for a week. It's been a lot of fun, and I have really enjoyed reading the articles that our friends sent back to us for inclusion. Do get in touch and let us know what you think...

 

The Hobopop Spotify Mixtape - Compiled by Mat Martin

Click on the link below to access the whole list, or click on the link below each song to hear the individual tracks. (You will need Spotify installed www.spotify.com/uk)
The Hobopop Spiral Earth Playlist

 

1. The Brute Chorus - Hercules

I love this band, and I do feel that the fact they aren't way bigger than, say, the Kings of Leon is a perfect illustration of the way the current state of the music industry is letting down listeners who are interested in intelligent and developing bands. Only five years ago it would have been a different story. It makes it special for those of us in the know though. The Brutes made their debut (from which this song comes) live, about six months before we did the last Kirsty album in the same way, and I was honoured to play banjo with them at that show. James' lyrics are just perfect here - the blend of obscure mythology, innuendo, rock n' roll and humour is expertly handled.
The Brute Chorus – Hercules

2. Devon Sproule - Old Virginia Block

I remember first hearing Devon at Matt & Phred's Jazz Club in Manchester's Northern Quarter, must've been 2007, as she'd just released this album ('Keep Your Silver Shined'), and nobody knew who she was yet. The room was only half full - it was very special. I've seen her play again several times since, but there was something about that show that remains special. 'Old Virginia Block' was easily my most played song of that year. So groovy.
Devon Sproule – Old Virginia Block

3. Gillian Welch - One Morning

I struggle to pick a favorite Gillian Welch song - she is so great. I always come back to this one though - my accompanist's ears I guess. I love more than anything else in this track the way that even though she and Dave Rawlings are playing different instruments you really can't tell who's playing what. And it's deliciously dark.
Gillian Welch – One Morning

4. Tom Waits - Green Grass

From my absolute all time favorite Waits record - 'Real Gone', this song was the song that started our 'two-step' phase which dominated the character of the 'Kansas Sessions' album. The simple guitar groove is so perfect, and the recording shows off Waits' mature voice so well. Then there's Marc Ribot's playing at the start - only a genius like Ribot would play an intro then shut up for the WHOLE song. And the whistling, oh, the whistling.
Tom Waits – Green Grass

5. Louis Armstrong - Do You Know What It Means (To Miss New Orleans)?

Armstrong is The Man according to my philosophy of music - that you should play and speak with one voice. It's something that you hear in very few people. Grapelli had it, John Hartford even tried to study it. To be able to pick up an instrument and communicate as freely as if you were talking. You can hear it here when he moves from singing to playing.
Louis Armstrong & His Dixieland Seven – Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans? - Remastered 1996

6. John Hartford - I Just Wanna Look In There

No-one writes quite like Hartford. I admire him enormously. This is from a late album that he seems to have made very Lo-Fi in his own home. I can't decide whether I think the phone call at the start is staged or just a happy accident. It certainly illustrates his awe-inspiring eccentricity, as do the lyrics. I love the way Hartford's playing is all about idea and not about technique. He'll always pick the take with the mistakes or dead notes in if that's the one that communicates the best.
John Hartford – I Just Wanna Look In There

7. Myshkin's Ruby Warblers - Ruby Warbler [Live]

There's not much of Myshkin's stuff on Spotify, except two live tracks from a compilation called Voices From the Siren Nation. 'Ruby Warbler', though, as you can hear her say at the top of the song, is a kind of theme song for her. The recording is rough and raw, but it demonstrates the edgy and visceral quality in her voice that I find so dangerous and exhilerating. You can hear it happening with the crowd too, as the song builds up and drops down again. Her voice makes the hair on my neck bristle every time I hear it.
Myshkin's Ruby Warblers – Ruby Warbler

8. Kreg Viesselman - The Man Without A Care

It's hard to pick a track from Kreg's 2007 album 'The Pull'. Every time I pick one I think that another one can't be left out. This is the track Myshkin singled out in her interview with him earlier this week, and it does show how fantastic he is with the rhythm of language - he hates being compared to other artists, otherwise I'd say something about Paul Simon's aptitude for that, too. Oh, and the Kora playing is awesome on this track.
Kreg Viesselman – The Man Without A Care

9. Karine Polwart - Rivers Run

This is one of my favourite songs from Karine's last album 'This Earthly Spell'. We've done a fair bit of work with her over the last few years, following her and Kirsty being nominated for the same BBC awards all that time ago. From the off she struck both of us as a songwriter with an incredible gift for cutting painfully to the core of an emotion. Usually just remembering certain songs of hers is enough for us to get a bit teary. She's been a good friend to us over the years too.
Karine Polwart – Rivers Run

10. Django Reinhardt & Stéphane Grapelli - Night and Day

I was about 17 when I first heard Reinhardt and Grapelli. I played both guitar and violin already. I was blown away, and I've never spent time away from them since. I didn't know you could do anything like this. I think that was when I first really thought you could do anything with music. I went to my violin techer and asked to learn some Jazz and she looked like I'd asked if we could partake in a spot of ritual sacrifice. That just made me want to do it even more.
Django Reinhardt , Stephane Grapelli – Night and day

11. Jesse Winchester - Eulalie

We first heard Jesse Winchester's writing when Mike West ('Kansas Sessions' producer) recorded 'Songbird' on one of his solo albums. Then Devon Sproule played this song at that Jazz Club show I mentioned above. It was about a year later when she recommended his 'Live From Mountain Stage' album to us. It's fabulous, gentle and well-wrought, so laid back and quietly confident. Lovely.
Jesse Winchester – Eulalie

12. Randy Newman - In Germany Before The War

This is a clever song like only Randy Newman can write them. Kirsty first heard this when John Wood ('Honeysuckle' producer) played it to her, and she played it to me later. I love this version because you can really get to the bones of the song without the orchestra. HIs arrangements are brilliant, but the 'Songbook' albums are my favourites, where you just get him and the piano. The lyric here is a masterclass in restraint and in using the unsaid to make things clear and uncomfortable at once.
Randy Newman – In Germany Before the War

13. Danny Schmidt - Firestorm

We've been playing this song ourselves at our very recent shows. Danny is a current favorite of ours - his writing is direct yet subtle and the humanity in his work is unmistakable. I love that line about 'There were palms demanding grease / In the old days I'd have nailed those palms to trees.' You can see the angry self peeping through the cracks in this lyric.
Danny Schmidt – Firestorm

14. Thom Yorke - The Clock

It's hard to make this track fit with the others on this list stylistically, but Thom has a place here. He's another favourite writer for both Kirsty and myself. There's something about the conversational style and intricacy of sound that makes his solo work and his work with Radiohead so completely unique. He must be one of his generation's most important musicians, and his voice is just beautiful. The way he uses vocal sound in this track is astonishing.
Thom Yorke – The Clock

15. Leadbelly - Sylvie

Old music rocks. Leadbelly completely passed me by until a year or so ago. I owe my love of his stuff at least in part to my good friend Gren Bartley, himself a fantastic guitar player.
Leadbelly – Bring Me A Little Water Silvy (Sylvie)

16. Guy Clark - Desperados Waiting For a Train

Music for grown men to cry to. Kirsty said to me when we last heard this that if anyone else was singing this song we wouldn't have time for it's sentimentality, but there's something about Guy that makes it weighty enough to break your heart every time. Thie image does always remind me of the opening scene from 'Once Upon A Time In The West' though.
Guy Clark – Desperados Waiting For A Train

17. Tom Waits - The Day After Tomorrow

Mentioned by Kirsty in her interview with Damien from Caulbearers earlier this week, to us this is the ultimate anti-war song. It's also another corker from that Tom Waits album - the recording is so real, so present. It's the perfect way to close this compilation on a serious but human note. I love it when Waits hums, too.
Tom Waits – Day After Tomorrow