Sunset Rubdown

I would like to do a sort of “round table” on this, have it going as a group e-mail interview that any one of you can jump in on/contribute to at any time, and we’ll go song-by-song, snake-by-snake. The first thing I’d like everyone to do is mention your favourite animal as appears in a Sunset Rubdown lyric, which song it’s in, and why you like or are intrigued by that particular animal.

Michael: My favorite would be the horse references from “The Men are Called Horsemen There.” They seem to describe male sexuality as something to be restrained and tamed by a lover, but also something men may struggle with and feel guilty about. Seems kinda clear in the lyric “If I were a horse, I’d throw up the reins if I were you,” as if to say, “you misunderstand me, see… we understand each other.” Like that saying, “We’re the same you and me, we’re the same don’t you see?” But he’s also talking about men in Spain, and whatever cultural differences exist, and the only things I know about Spanish men come from Don Quixote, Picasso, and Gaudy, and they were all mad visionaries like Spencer. So he could be saying something like, “I ain’t no horseman [meaning oversexed]; you’ve never seen horsemen. I’ve been to Spain! In Spain they’re horsemen! And they thought I was one too, but I’m not, they got me wrong, I’m just this dumb kid from Penticton [or wherever Spencer is from in BC] and I was drunk and nervous and seduced, and maybe thought I could be a horse, but I’m hardly a pony!”

We don’t really ask Spencer to explain his lyrics. Maybe this song is just about genitalia and racial stereotyping, as if having sex with a man (who happens to be Spanish) who has a huge horse cock would be way too painful and they should get off that ride… maybe find a pony instead, or just a dirty little dog.

Jordan: Wow, that was a really graphic analysis Mike.

CMG: Michael totally turned this x-rated; all I wanted to know was whether the song was about cowboys or gay cowboys. Michael – where do you get the Spain bit from? I must have missed that.

Michael: In the beginning of the song Spencer sings, “So you need me to say that I’m sorry / That someone undressed me as professed to me / In Spain with their eyes.”

One other thing I like about the song is how it switches characters. The verse that starts “the Casanova ran…”; this is the voice of the camera, to use a film analogy. It describes the characters and the scene, and the song is elevated from a personal confession to something more literary.

CMG: “I am no horseman / and you are no angel.” Who is the non-angel?

Michael: The character being apologized to. I take this expression as a way of giving a human face to the (sometimes) divine expectations of love. The point being that honesty is better than trying to be perfect in an imperfect world.

Jordan: You’ve covered horses pretty well so I guess all we’re left with are snakes and crows and unidentified cannibal-monsters. Snakes are frequent in Spencer’s songs. Sometimes the point of view appears to be sympathetic to their plight (“Snakes Got a Leg”) or it’s a view where they’re perceived as cunning, evil things (“Empty Threats of Little Lord”). Far be it from me to actually claim to know what Spencer’s intended symbolism is with these animals, but they do often make me have an immediate gut reaction.

“The Empty Threats of Little Lord” seems to be talking about a society in the process of collapse. If you were to visualize the lyrics on some archaic fresco wall you’d get a series of apocalyptic images that pinpoint the end of days of a country that has abandoned its original values. Since everything that was supposed to work for the population has fallen to corruption and great divisions in control and justice, it only makes sense that snakes are running rampant in the night. I see them as the forbearers of doom, in a mythological sense, or as actual individuals who have gone mad with the power they’ve attained through dishonest means. One can defend him or herself, but as the song title says, it’s an empty threat, though at least not one without principle. Actually, I see this as a really positive song because to me it affirms that you’ll either have to face up to the chaos or you’ll bring it to yourself.

CMG: The obvious symbolism for “snake” is even dirtier than “horseman” (OK – maybe not quite). But then there’s “snake in the grass,” or the biblical snake, or the symbolic snake that’s eating its own tail, which signifies mortality. Does anyone think that Spencer is getting at one of those “traditional” snakes, and, if so, why?

Michael: I am not familiar with all the traditional snake mythology, but there seems to be a negative, biting edge to it, kind of conflicted. If snakes are bad, then sometimes it feels good to be bad, or you can somehow respect the nature of the snake. Just think of how much it can swallow, literally and metaphorically. They’re tough beasts.

CMG: Why does Spencer “wish you the best, you snake?” What’s the conflicted relationship with the snake all about?

Jordan: I always thought that line was subtle sarcasm, based upon what was being said before hand.

Camilla: The song always just made me think of breaking into swimming pools in the summer and drinking too much. I always thought about that snake in a really traditional way – as the tempter. But good lord, what do I know? Never really did cotton to the literary analysis. I actually didn’t really know at all what Spencer was saying in a lot of our songs until we got into the studio and heard him track the vocals. I really do think the lyrics are so beautiful, though, and sometimes I wish he would write them down.

…I’m not being helpful, am I? I just don’t really try to decipher the lyrics too much because they seem personal to me (whether or not that’s actually the case, I couldn’t say), so because I know him I don’t really like to dig too deep, either just as a matter of privacy or else a reluctance to invent misunderstandings. It’s different than poetry – I have a feeling that sometimes things get written just because they fit the music or sound good, which isn’t to say that they’re meaningless or of any less value, but it certainly complicates interpretation. Am I out of the game?

CMG: No – that’s exactly the kind of (for lack of a better word) “tension” that I was hoping to explore. Your privacy comment – I mean, I’m sure Spencer’s words make sense to him, but as you guys are showing in your conflicting interpretations, his words don’t really lend themselves to expressing anything specific; the listener has no idea where these snakes and horsemen are coming from. And, I guess, that would be the “private” part, right? So, really, what’s going on is that the songwriter feels the impulse to “express,” but only to satisfy him/herself, since no one else can figure out what’s being expressed exactly.

It’s like a puzzle. You go to R.E.M. and think “ok, Stipe is gay, he’s got political activist leanings, he’s from Georgia where there’s a whole ball of historical human rights messes that aren’t cleaned up yet” and then you can work with those things to figure out your own best-possible-answer to “what do these songs mean?” So my question now is: “Why does breaking into the McGill swimming pool make you think of the ‘Little Lord’ song?”

Jordan: When you say that these lyrics add up to only to satisfy the artist, I’d disagree, because the vagueness allows for interpretations that will be different and will reflect the type of person interpreting them.

Camilla: What I meant by the privacy thing is that I know a lot more about my bandmate than I do about Michael Stipe, so I feel a bit differently about trying to glean some sort of meaning from the lyrics of the former. And, in fact, I feel like there’s a lot more room for error, because you have the impression that you know what’s going on in this person’s life, when, actually, we really don’t, at least not on the really emotional level that his songwriting seems to come from. The last band I was in had three songwriters. One had a pretty upfront kind of style – I always knew what/who she was talking about – whereas the other had a really more cryptic way of writing lyrics. I remember they used to ask me about mine, and sometimes they’d get it right, but only ever on one level. One song can so easily contain so many different layers of emotion and references. That’s why we write songs or poems or whatever – it’s a way of articulating things that are difficult to express in normal conversation.

That’s why it’s hard to answer a question about Spencer’s conflicted relationship with this snake. I just picked up on the line “There are snakes out in the night / All these kids have gone astray,” and it conjured up a place full of kids at night being tempted, by whatever nefarious substances or behaviours, which made me think of breaking into the swimming pool drunk in large droves. I was really just trying to throw out an example to contrast Jordan’s apocalypse.

Jordan: All these animals don’t necessarily have to mean anything outside of Spencer’s head. Carl Jung believed that people dealt with their unconscious through symbols in dreams, art, religion, etc. And maybe part of the reason some people describe Spencer’s music as creepy is because of the various symbols that are scattered throughout it that have the logic of dreams.

CMG: Okay, let’s redirect: have you guys played the Shut Up I Am Dreaming songs much live? What’s the general response from the audience, and how do you guys respond to the songs as they’re being played?

Camilla: I was looking at the album, and there are only two songs on it that we’ve never played live (“The Empty Threats of Little Lord” and “Shut Up I Am Dreaming of Places…”), since we wrote them in the studio. A few of the other songs changed during the recording, so we almost had to relearn them recently when we started practicing again. “Us Ones in Between” was only ever played once (at our first show), and it was just a duet with Spencer and I. People seemed to like it then, but I think it’ll be really nice now that it’s filled out. Mike and Jordan added some really rad stuff pretty much spontaneously during the recording.

But, yeah, I’m obviously a little nervous that our fourth show ever is going to be in LA. We’ve only ever really played for crowds containing lots of our pals, and I may have to be reintroduced to the feeling of playing to a room full of people with crossed arms. I think this is going to be a really important time for us in terms of our development as a band. That sounded so dorky, but, honestly, I’m excited about what our live show turns out to be. Hopefully no more broken accordion straps, though. It’s hard sometimes for me to deal with my little corner where I’m boxed in behind all my instruments, but I’m sure I’ll find ways to transcend that.

Michael: I remember after the second show, a close friend of mine said that he wasn’t into how choppy and start-stop-start some of the songs were, as if we weren’t allowing ourselves to get into a groove and jam out for a while. I think he’s referring to “Snakes Got a Leg” and “They Took a Vote,” where the songs are 4 or 5 really tight chord progressions with jumpstarts and quick stops. I think this kind of response points to the strength of Spencer’s writing; it’s diverse and scattered and keeps the listener on their toes by subverting their expectations. What someone may see as contradictions in style, I see a commitment to experimentation. Although I don’t think Spencer writes songs with any strategy in mind, as if the next song has to be different than the last one. He really can’t help it; it’s how he gets through the day.

The artist who did the cover, Matt Moroz, is very close to this temperament. In the many years I have known Matt, he has changed his approach to his art several times a year, or even more, but at the same time has produced a distinct quality that is completely his own. It makes a lot sense that he was asked to do the artwork for Wolf Parade and Sunset Rubdown.

As for me, I don’t get bored easily when I play the songs, but Spencer insists that I will when we tour. I find that the song structures he creates already seem familiar to me, like listening to the blues, or early jazz, or classical, where I may think that I know the song, but it’s really just another version of another song, or just familiar patterns put together backwards, or one song made out of two different songs. This is how a lot of early rock and roll was written. Perhaps pop music (when it comes down to it, we are all playing pop songs) is at a place where it can effortlessly reference and recycle itself without intention, without irony, and without critique, and without bothering the listener too much. It’s no longer “different” or “special” but rather a completely entrenched form of self- and cultural expression. I think Spencer’s writing reflects that.

Or maybe it’s because of technology and how everyone has all this insane mixture of gear and gear can be a big determining factor when it comes to aesthetics? I don’t know – maybe that’s a load of bullshit, and whether it’s true or not makes no difference to how much I enjoy playing and listening to music. As my friend Robin Simpson might say, at the end of the night, it’s all about how good the party was.

Jordan: I’m really excited to tour with Frog Eyes. Mike, Camilla, and I will be spiking Spencer’s drinks with Caffeine pills.

CMG: For all three, again: How does a Sunset Rubdown song usually get born?

Michael: The birth of a song comes from Spencer, but I guess when he is writing, he is potentially writing for either Wolf Parade or us or for some unknown project like Swan Lake. I remember that while recording our album, he had 4 or 5 new songs and had to choose which ones he was going to use for Swan Lake or Sunset. He played a couple songs on a guitar for us and we gave him a response and he didn’t say much, and then I think we used one for the new album, and he gave the rest to Swan Lake. I remember really liking one of the songs more than another one and telling him so, and then he told me he would use the one I liked in Swan Lake, which didn’t bother me at all. As I said, I’m really excited to hear that record. Carey and Dan are making some of the most interesting music right now, and in some ways at totally different ends of the spectrum, so it’ll be neat to hear how these three guys collide. I remember he told me he had to go out west with 4 or 5 songs for that project. I don’t really know how he makes those decisions, but it probably has a lot to do with the people he will play with and the instrumentation and skills available through those people.

Anyway, once it’s a Sunset Rubdown song, we usually just jam out on it in whatever configuration we happen to be in (Jordan and I switch up the drums for guitar occasionally, although I play more guitar, cause I am not a great drummer, and Jordan does his drums / keyboard magic so well). And we try and pick up the melodies by following a vocal line or breaking down chords into little runs or picking patterns and to put it simply, just flesh it out. If it’s not working, we would try and switch up the instruments and try it again. Spencer may have one specific melody that he wants to hear over top of what he is playing on the piano, or a really specific intro, like those descending lines from “I’m Sorry I Stood on Your Hands” or “Jason,” which he wrote completely but needed a second instrument to create a slight delay effect where the melody is being followed by a second identical one but just one note behind it. Each song has its own story though and I don’t think I can even recall all the details. “Jason” took about a year to get to where its at now, but “I’m Sorry I Stood on Your Hands” was written in really quickly and has pretty much remained the same for a while, except for the drum line, which changed in the studio. Sometimes Spencer won’t have any ideas other than the skeleton of a song and he leaves it up to us to fill it up and then we all talk about it together. It’s not a complete dictatorship. We all have a say and we are all concerned that everyone is enjoying the part being played.

CMG: How did you get involved in the project, and what were you doing before you were Sunset Rubdown (I know Camilla was in Pony Up! – and I really liked that Marlon Brando song, by the way, and someone from your band cut my girlfriend’s hair once and did a great job, so tell her thanks for that please), and what you do when you’re not in Sunset Rubdown.

Michael: Before Sunset Rubdown I was playing guitar in a band called the Ten Commandments. It was a similar situation for me as a guitar player, where I was working with a song writer, Dave Lewkowich, one of the best singers and lyricists I have ever heard. We would do these epic ballads, western themed cowboy and Celine-inspired narratives. We also did a bunch of Bertolt Bretch covers and adapted Robert Service poetry. Jordan played with us briefly as well. This was the band that I cut my teeth on in Montreal. They are still playing regular gigs in Montreal and have a 7-inch coming out on a Vancouver label soon. Before that I was playing in a rock band with Dave and Arlen Thompson, and a few other kids. That band collapsed within a year, and we never even came up with a name for us, but had about 8 or 9 songs. There’s always talk between some of us of that band re-forming at some point. Everyone got too busy with other things like school or other bands. This was right before Wolf Parade formed, so we were sharing a jam space and Arlen on drums.

(As for) how I got involved with sunset? I saw Spencer at a show in December 2004 and he told me he was thinking of making Sunset Rubdown into a band and wondered if I would want to play guitar. I said sure, but we didn’t really know when that would happen, if ever, because Wolf Parade was about to get really busy. Then in January 2005, Wolf Parade asked me to photograph them for their press package that Sub Pop needed. At that shoot Spencer and I talked about it more and made a plan to play some music. We got together at his place and played some songs, “Snake’s Got a Leg” and something else. It was fun, and it ended up being fairly productive for the first practice. I wrote a guitar riff that night for the ending of “Snakes Got a Leg III” that I still play.

Camilla: I got kicked out of Pony Up! in January of 2005, and I sort of thought that might be it for me and bands. I got another job as a pastry chef (my trade), and that was that. Then, one day in May, pretty much out of the blue, Spencer called me and asked if I maybe wanted to try playing with Sunset Rubdown. I didn’t really know him very well at all— we just had friends in common. I don’t think I’d ever even met Mike or Jordan before. The first practice I went to it was a big rainstorm, and I was so nervous, and I almost killed myself riding my bike with all my instruments and a little amp wrapped in a garbage bag. Anyway, I guess it worked out. I have good luck once in a while.

When I first joined the band, most of the songs were already worked out (those from the solo album, for instance), and I guess Spencer had some specific ideas about what he wanted me to do, since he’d sought me out. So we spent time together before practice where he’d teach me parts. I suppose the other two would have more to say about the development of those songs. Since then, we actually haven’t had a lot of time to ever jam, as it were. For probably the past eight months we’ve either been apart or just practicing songs for playing live. Like I said, stuff also got written in during the really, really short period of time we were in the studio. By writing, I mean that Spencer will usually come in with the skeleton of a song— the chord progression, melody, sometimes lyrics, then we’ll all flesh it out. Most things tend to benefit from a little Q~Chord, that’s definitely a songwriting principle. Songs will invariably change, though. As Jordan said, the version of “Jason” we played live last time, and the one we’ll play live this time, are fairly different. Constant improvement?

Up until the end of February, I was a pastry chef’s assistant, but these days I just worry about the tour and scheme on opening a bakery. When the band isn’t practicing, I play with Secret Choir (a nine-piece DIY choir) or try in vain to finish my collaboration with Cadence Weapon or noodle around on guitar with my best friend, our soundperson, in her bedroom.

CMG: This begs the scandalous question: how did your crush on Rollie (Pemberton, a.k.a. Cadence Weapon) get you kicked out of Pony Up? Answer as fancifully as you want.

Camilla: Actually, it’s the other way around— Rollie has a crush on me. I think he may have even asked me to marry him once.

CMG: Rollie, is this shit true?

Rollie Pemberton: Totally. I convince her to let me stay at her house, only to try and use my vibes to get her to come out of the room and onto my sleeping couch . . . of love.

CMG: Glad that’s settled.

How and why did Montreal end up such a popular Canadian migratory destination for BC musicians? It seems like — at least with your circle — there’s been a mass exodus to Montreal.

Camilla: The mass exodus of BC kids was intense. I’d like to have that explained. I moved here from Alberta 6.5 years ago because university was 1/2 price, as were apartments. The latter, at least, has changed. I blame it on all those BC kids.

Michael: It’s nothing new to Canadians that Montreal is a great city to live in, for anyone, but especially for artists and musicians. It’s been popular in this way since perhaps Expo 67, who knows? It’s our cultural hub, it’s our city that never sleeps, it’s a strong university town, its the cheapest place in Canada to live in, therefore it attracts artists who are typically low income and are looking for a good time, strong community and a strong arts culture. If you only speak English, like me, you can get by ok because its the only city in Quebec that is bilingual and really accepting of Anglophones, but it hasn’t been easy, and I would consider myself lucky for lasting as long as I have. I can thank the tourist industry or the richest neighborhood in Canada, Westmount, which is mostly English and where I work my minimum wage book clerk day job, which is my dream day job.

The thing that really helped was how a lot of my friends moved here as well, so we stick together. You need a community, it’s like having family out here. The city is great, but it’s not enough. If everyone I knew left, I would probably follow. But some people go away to BC for a year and then come back in the spring when its gets nice and they stay for a while. And while they are in BC it’s nice to have some people to see and crash with if you decide to visit the west coast. There are a bunch of people in this circle spread out all over, coming and going.

CMG: Are all of the massive guitar solos the work of one of you guys, or shared work? Are they written or improvised as you’re recording the song?

Michael: I don’t play any of the massive guitar solos on the record, like in “Stadiums,” “Horsemen,” (I play drums on both) or “Shut Up,” which is all Jordan. Jordan and I actually recorded a solo each at the same time for that part in “Shut Up” and we could hardly hear each other. We did three takes I think. We wanted that part to be really noisy and chaotic, but ended up cutting my solo cause Jordan’s fit perfectly. I do play guitar on our live version of “Shut Up,” cause it needs Jordan’s drummin/keyboard skills. That song was built in the studio starting with Spencer playing the acoustic guitar. He’s a fantastic guitar player but I can’t play that song the way he does, all fingers and thumb at once and really fast. He’s got those fast piano hands. I would just cramp up. So I play it with a pick a little muted and beefed up on an electric. I’m excited about messing with that solo at our shows. I do take my cues from Jordan, ‘cause it’s totally wicked, but don’t expect it to be note for note. It’s the only time during the set that I will get to improvise something, so I will definitely take liberties.

CMG: I think the album would be great as an alternate score to Edward Scissorhands. “Discuss, maybe with reference to a more suitable movie.”

Jordan: That’s funny you say that because when I played the album for my friend Mathieu he said that the song “I’m sorry I sang on your hands” made him think of Tim Burton. We constantly refer to this song as “Donnie Darko” for reasons that are unknown to me. <
CMG: How does Wolf Parade feel about Sunset Rubdown?

Jordan: The guys in Wolf Parade have been really supportive of this band; we’ve played two shows where Dante, Arlen and Hadji did their blues jams. I would also like to publicly thank Arlen for letting me use his drums since Sunset Rubdown has started. I’d be pretty screwed without them.

CMG: Okay, so: “What’s the point of you guys playing this music?”

Camilla: I love Spencer’s songs. That’s it. Selfish? I just love playing them and hearing them and singing them.