Spires Interview With Taralie Paterson

recupero qui un'intervista via e.mail fatta il marzo scorso a Taralie Paterson in occasione del disco nuovo delle Spires. Intervista che per un motivo e per un altro non mi è stato possibile pubblicare da nessuna parte. Mi pesa troppo il culo ora a tradurre e quindi ve la leggete in inglese cari i miei global citizens...

Spires That In Sunset Rise. A mysterious expression.

well spires that in the sunset rise came to kathleen through a translation of "flowers of evil" by baudelaire, I think it provoked an exciting image and expressed the energy of our music, its not easy finding a band name! and also the band name in itself isn't easy kinda like our music,

witchcraft, occultism, satanism.

well the witch tag doesn't bother me so much, especially these days I am meeting all sorts of people who consider themselves witches and I think the label witch is getting a new and better meaning. to be a witch for me is to see the depth and magic in things, everyday things, that the western linear world has deadened. satanism, I don't know, the devil-god/goodness whatever they are the same thing, coming from the same source the eternal........we are not devil worshippers by any degree, we are pagans really. I am so glad that our music helped you with the spirits, that is exactly what we are doing, i think. recently we went camping the three of us in the band, and we were in the real woods, pitch darkness except our fire, and we thought we would play some of our music.......well we tried and basically we scared the shit out of ourselves, which was great, i think we ended up putting our detuned instruments down, and just using our voices. Anyways, I realized in retrospect that what we have been doing is bringing this intense energy of the dark woods to the city, and trying to actually play that kind of music in the woods was tooo much. the woods already do it for you. but in the city, i always find our music beautiful and balancing. I see beauty in the darkness not the devil or anti beauty themes. its like death, has got a really bad rap because of all the fear and pain, but really death is amazingly beautiful and it gives life magic and depth,

Curse The Traced Bird.

the title came from a song lyric, which is oddly how we named all of our albums thus far......for me the lyric speaks directly of the spires ethos: which is don't do whats been done! and especially don't pin down something like music/or a bird which is the symbol of freedom and expression. that's not to say I don't love traditional musics, that just hasn't been for us I guess.

Sun City Girls, Comus, Harry Partch, the Others

well the band changed, Tracy is no longer playing, and also Me and Kathy moved to Madison, and with Georgia still in Chicago she hasn't been able to play as much. These songs were written with me and Kathy as the core and Georgia added on later. The albums prior it was random who wrote what songs and who played what, this album isn't quite as random....I also think not having drums is a big deal in forming the music, and this album has no obvious drums, some minor percussion thats all. We are influenced by those artists you mentioned, among others so it would make sense that we have those sounds in our music. I think you are right, i think it is a bit more centered on atmosphere, the last album it was like we were trying so many different ideas, they each got played out, but this one seems a bit more centered....

Kathleen Bird, Tar Pet

well this is a good question, Kathleen does have some new songs, as do I whether or not we sit our butts down and get it all going is still a question......we've used some of our solo stuff for group work.

Classic question

well me and kathleen met in highschool on the cross country team.....and Tracy (who is my sister) met Georgia in the city concert band, and I met Georgia through her.....its been a long story of friendship and music. All starting probably 17 or more years ago...

How would you define your music?

thats your job! ha ha......music of the dark wood in the city, using the void as a canvas for inspiration, music expressing something lost and yet something thats never been found before, music of light/death/earth, music that draws you in and then makes you chase it around......

Chicago, folk scene

well the Albini scene and all that I've never paid much attention to especially the tortoise part-I always rather loathed tortoise, there is a lot a lot lot more going on in chicago than that stuff, music that is way more interesting over the past ten years that I've been hangin around great groups have been: Metalux, the Flying Luttenbachers, Plastic crimewave sound, the coughs, panicsville, Lichens(who is still around and is very much in our genre), Bird show, Dream Weapon, number none, and theres tons more really. Chicago noise/no wave/experimental stuff i guess you could call it was a part of my beginnings not folk so much. the whole folk thing was a coincidence, the only bands i was listening to when we started out doing our thing was tower recordings, jandek, and like old folkies from the sixties: Skip Spence, Melanie, Nick Drake....I think the folk thing for me came out of a natural need for balance, because at the time I was drumming and also playing saxophone in two different groups that were like the noise/no wave/psych freak out stuff and I would come home at night and record an intimate acoustic solo Tar Pet thing that would sound so good in comparison to what was being played around me, I really had no idea there was a folk scene happening. I didn't record Tar Pet with any hope of even really releasing it or sharing it ever. It is interesting you mention Philadelphia, because this past year we've spent more time in Philadelphia recording with Greg Weeks at his Hexham Head studios, and he is integral to that whole folk scene there so we have been introduced to what a lot of those people are doing and its great but yeah you are right its a lot different than chicago. But its also a lot different than spires stuff too, I think you can tell than spires is born out of the more experimental stuff than the folk stuff. Really spires isn't folky at all......is it? I guess it is in a weird way, I just became very attracted to acoustic instruments and their broader range of interesting sounds....

write music

sometimes we improvise together, sometimes somebody has an idea, sometimes we agonize over the course of weeks how a song goes, and sometimes we get it right from the beginning, its a lot of recording and listening thats for sure, and a lot of editing, a lot of songs don't make it...

Plastic Steve Crimewave Krakow

Steve Krakow is probably the reason I moved to Chicago, we met in the college dorms at U of Illinois back in like 92.....he was the man who let me crash on his couch so I could get my shit together to move to chicago. We have collaborated before, I drummed in his super freak out psych acid rock band "the Unshown"...back in like 00-01, I would consider collaborating with him again, he is busy though and now we don't live in the same city. Is Steve crazy? well in a way steve is one of the most grounded people I've ever met, I would not use the word crazy. He definitely knows what he wants and it just so happens that we agree a lot on what excites us musically so we have a great friendship, we've been through a lot, he gave me my first tab of acid.....ha ha

instruments

the new album doesn't use any new instruments actually.....what is new is the use of the loop sampler/ line 6......which is like an instrument. we used the piano on the first album, for the epic song "tampico". i love piano. its not very convenient though....

world

I love world music, probably I listen to world sounds at least half the time, traditional asian music is among my favorites, african, eastern european,

Will you return in Italy?

I hope so!

God bless you.

well thank you!