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Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Nora Jones and today I'm playing along with

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Speaker 1: Broken Record Podcast.

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Speaker 2: I'm just playing lone we say.

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Speaker 1: Hey, I'm Norah Jones, and today we're doing something a

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Speaker 1: little different. We're sharing a fantastic episode from another podcast

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Speaker 1: that we love. It's called Broken Record. On Broken Record,

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Speaker 1: acclaimed producer Rick Rubin, best selling author Malcolm Gladwell, and

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Speaker 1: others interview storied musicians from every genre about their lives,

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Speaker 1: inspiration and music. I was a guest of Broken Record

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Speaker 1: back in November of twenty nineteen in the early days

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Speaker 1: of the podcast. I got to talk to Malcolm Gladwell

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Speaker 1: and Bruce Headlam. Be sure to check that out if

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Speaker 1: you get a chance. Today, we're sharing a recent interview

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Speaker 1: with Feist. She is one of my favorites. I love

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Speaker 1: her so much, and this episode of the Broken Record

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Speaker 1: podcast is so good because she goes really deep about

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Speaker 1: her music and her life, and I think it's the

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Speaker 1: most I've ever heard her talk about her music. In April,

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Speaker 1: Feist released her sixth album, Multitudes and It's Beautiful. It's

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Speaker 1: an album she wrote in the wake of losing her

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Speaker 1: father and after becoming a first time mother. Just months

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Speaker 1: before the pandemic began. Today we'll hear Broken Record podcast

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Speaker 1: producer Leah Rose talk to Feis about the new album

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Speaker 1: and how she was inspired to make new music after

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Speaker 1: performing at an experimental music festival in Berlin. She also

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Speaker 1: talks about things in her life that happened and explains

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Speaker 1: how she found solace in writing new songs amidst the

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Speaker 1: exhaustion of early motherhood. So here's the episode. I really

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Speaker 1: hope you enjoy it as much as I did. You

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Speaker 1: can listen to more episodes of Broken Record from Pushkin

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Speaker 1: Industries wherever you get your podcasts.

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Speaker 3: Pushkin. Canadian born singer songwriter five has been one of

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Speaker 3: the most dynamic indie voices of the last two decades.

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Speaker 3: She scored international fame early in her career, thanks in

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Speaker 3: part to a nano iPod commercial featuring the song one, two,

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Speaker 3: three four, But for fans of Feist, her appeal lies

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Speaker 3: in how she mines her complex emotional life. Just last month,

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Speaker 3: Feist released her sixth album, Multitudes. She recorded it in

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Speaker 3: the aftermath of tremendous personal loss and change. In late

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Speaker 3: twenty nineteen. Feist adopted a baby just months before the

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Speaker 3: pandemic started. About a year later, her father died suddenly.

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Speaker 3: Multitudes is a raw and intimate look at how she

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Speaker 3: grappled with deep seated grief and a new kind of love.

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Speaker 3: On today's episode, Lea Rose talks with Feist about how

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Speaker 3: being assaulted in high school ultimately led to her gaining resilience.

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Speaker 3: Feist also remembers the day her music career began when

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Speaker 3: she was asked to front a hardcore band, and how

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Speaker 3: screaming on age and ultimately blowing out her voice forced

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Speaker 3: her to develop her intimate, career defining singing style. This

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Speaker 3: is broken record liner notes for the digital age. I'm

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Speaker 3: justin Ritchman. Here's Lea Rose with Feist.

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Speaker 2: I have read the PR blurb about the new album,

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Speaker 2: but I would love to hear in your words, just

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Speaker 2: talk about how the project started to come together.

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Speaker 4: Yes, well, everything was pretty topsy turvy, there wasn't it.

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Speaker 4: I mean, there was a complete reframe. There was no

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Speaker 4: presumption of the way things used to be is the

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Speaker 4: way they're going to be. And interestingly, the outside world

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Speaker 4: was sort of echoing what was going on for me

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Speaker 4: in my inside world, which was that nothing was to

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Speaker 4: be presumed, nothing that had been was going to be

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Speaker 4: because I had just become a mother right four months

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Speaker 4: before the pandemic started, so it was sort of a

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Speaker 4: double down of complete reassessment. And you know, a friend

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Speaker 4: of mine said something that has become unfortunately so true.

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Speaker 4: I mean, fortunately unfortunately that to become a parent is

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Speaker 4: to be incinerated and so true. But who rises from

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Speaker 4: the ashes is a more interesting person to be for

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Speaker 4: the rest of your life. And I'm still working on that.

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Speaker 4: I'm trying to figure out if if this is more interesting, but.

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Speaker 2: I know it's like I just feel like a like

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Speaker 2: depleted version but hopefully eventually more interesting.

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Speaker 4: Well, the way I've been looking at it is the

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Speaker 4: person who decided to the person who felt capable of

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Speaker 4: being a mother to decided to become a mother, she

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Speaker 4: was actually not very useful and not very helpful at

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Speaker 4: being a mother. So you know, that was then echoed

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Speaker 4: by the whole world kind of being uncomfortable with their

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Speaker 4: former selves that didn't serve them anymore in this new context.

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Speaker 4: And every I felt like everywhere I looked, any and

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Speaker 4: close to me, let alone, kind of collectively, there was

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Speaker 4: just this crucible that was just incinerating every presumption that

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Speaker 4: came from a previous time, you know, And so songs

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Speaker 4: kind of they became what there they always have been

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Speaker 4: to me, but like they certainly were even more so

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Speaker 4: a kind of a habit that I returned to that

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Speaker 4: brought me comfort or like a it might be in

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Speaker 4: that incineration, some last living arm lunged out of the

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Speaker 4: quicksand like ah and grabbed it a little filament of

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Speaker 4: a former self or something, because I found it really

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Speaker 4: helped me to use some of those wee hours and

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Speaker 4: those sort of that liminal state of pure exhaustion and

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Speaker 4: to open myself to that and and a lot of

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Speaker 4: new things and new parts of me were very slowly

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Speaker 4: given a little a place to you know, work out

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Speaker 4: what that was going to look like in in the

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Speaker 4: form of songs. So it was, you know, kind of

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Speaker 4: like a like some people return to hiking, or they

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Speaker 4: get they go swimming, clear their head, they you know,

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Speaker 4: whatever they've done their whole life to return to a

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Speaker 4: kind of a privacy that is going to maybe help

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Speaker 4: them like untangle something. In my very fortunate case, I've

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Speaker 4: always found that in writing a song over the years,

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Speaker 4: like I can almost every one of my songs has

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Speaker 4: in some way been my attempt to understand some unknowable moments.

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Speaker 2: Are there any songs on the new album that directly

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Speaker 2: relate to being a new parent that helped you articulate

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Speaker 2: something that you couldn't quite grasp before.

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Speaker 4: Well, I would say the only song that you know

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Speaker 4: she will know was about her is the song Forever Before,

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Speaker 4: which I think might be the second song I think.

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Speaker 4: And it came from this idea that to commit so intentionally,

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Speaker 4: to walk so directly right towards the precipice of complete vulnerability,

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Speaker 4: is to become a mother. And I had never begun

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Speaker 4: a Forever Before. I mean, that was sort of there

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Speaker 4: was no sidling out of that commitment. It was a

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Speaker 4: true commitment. And you know, as much as I feel

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Speaker 4: that I have been committed to things in my life

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Speaker 4: before I've shown all the way up to different things

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Speaker 4: and different relationships and different ways of thinking or ways

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Speaker 4: of being, the ways of relating, I had never done

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Speaker 4: something that could not be undone or that I hope

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Speaker 4: will never be undone. It is. It's the first, one

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Speaker 4: hundred percent, just like dive dive in, you know, And

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Speaker 4: so that song kind of helped in a way. It

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Speaker 4: chronologically over the three verses. It's sort of it's like

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Speaker 4: a little parenthesis around maybe the years leading up to

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Speaker 4: understanding the basis of my life and how it was

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Speaker 4: no longer enough or something, and how that I wanted

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Speaker 4: to expand and make myself prone to the unknown.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: On your song Borrow Trouble, there's some lyrics that talk

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Speaker 2: about picturing a life that you are left out of

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Speaker 2: and how that is maybe different than what you imagined,

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Speaker 2: And it seems to me like you're now trying to

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Speaker 2: appreciate a life that you've created for yourself.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, I would say I found the idea years ago

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Speaker 4: that like, if I can't make it better, if it's

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Speaker 4: out of with it not within my power to make

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Speaker 4: it better, it being what, you know, whatever, I'm in

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Speaker 4: the midst of chying to face or solve like psychicalge

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Speaker 4: break equation of like solve for X. It's like the

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Speaker 4: X is ever changing and it is ever present, and

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Speaker 4: it's just going to shape shift and always be something

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Speaker 4: to need to solve. And if I can't make it better,

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Speaker 4: at least I can learn how to not make it worse.

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Speaker 4: And to not make it worse means you not spin

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Speaker 4: my wheels in and concretized thinking or learning actually what

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Speaker 4: the mechanics of passive aggressivity is and what it is

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Speaker 4: to And that's another thing about to commit to the

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Speaker 4: words that come out of your mouth. It's sort of

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Speaker 4: bootcamp for committing to the steps you take towards in

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Speaker 4: which directions and all of that, I guess is it's

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Speaker 4: sort of been the quiet background of all the work

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Speaker 4: I've done in my life and my mind. And as

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Speaker 4: art imitates life, songs the songs these songs in particular

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Speaker 4: have taken the form of like a roadmap or as

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Speaker 4: we all self mythologize, you know in our you don't

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Speaker 4: and as friends who work very different they have different

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Speaker 4: jobs than me, friends who don't get a response from

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Speaker 4: the world about what their work is. They say, hey,

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Speaker 4: don't kid yourself. I have the exact same self mythologizing.

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Speaker 4: I invest in the lore of my life. What is

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Speaker 4: you know, the background of my childhood and what it

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Speaker 4: did to me and how it created the expectations that

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Speaker 4: I then had to fight to. You know, It's just

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Speaker 4: that in my case, I work it out in this

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Speaker 4: way that can then be like a silly, petty puzzle

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Speaker 4: piece that someone people can take it and then reform

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Speaker 4: it to fit the puzzle that they're trying to solve.

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Speaker 2: You know, yeah, I'm curious, like, what were you like

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Speaker 2: in high school? What were you into?

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Speaker 4: Like?

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Speaker 2: What kind of kid were you in high school?

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Speaker 4: Well? I suppose I was probably kind of shy, but

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Speaker 4: I also had started to go to all the punk

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Speaker 4: shows in my town, and I had assumed the exterior

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Speaker 4: of looking other than what I was on the inside.

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Speaker 4: And I was sort of you know, I had piercings

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Speaker 4: and shaved my head and it was manic panic and

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Speaker 4: I was. And I went to a pretty conservative high school.

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Speaker 4: And maybe in the first couple of maybe the first

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Speaker 4: month or two or something of my first year of

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Speaker 4: high school, I was attacked by a group of guys,

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Speaker 4: not like I mean, here I am making excuses for them,

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Speaker 4: like not violently, but come on, Like I was lifted

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Speaker 4: up and slammed into a wall and handcuffed to a door.

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Speaker 4: And then I've actually never told this story except to friends,

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Speaker 4: but at this point I kind of understand how this was.

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Speaker 4: All The adversity I was against was like ultimately helpful

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Speaker 4: but very difficult. But the whole student body, you know,

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Speaker 4: no one came to my aid. They created kind of

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Speaker 4: like a giant school size semi circle around me, and

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Speaker 4: you know, laughed and jeered and snickered, and then we're

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Speaker 4: shooed into the cafeteria. And then the vice principal, I guess,

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Speaker 4: after like half an hour or something, I got un

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Speaker 4: handcuffed and was completely in shock. And then he he

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Speaker 4: was like, who did this? And I said, I don't know.

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Speaker 4: They came up from behind me, and he said, that's

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Speaker 4: why we don't want kids like you here. And then

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Speaker 4: he made me walk through the entire cafeteria in front

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Speaker 4: of him, while he walked behind me through a dead

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Speaker 4: silent cafeteria so that I would tell him who had

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Speaker 4: done this, and up and down the rows of the

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Speaker 4: different seats while the only sound in the cafeteria was

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Speaker 4: my own crying because I was, you know, choking in

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Speaker 4: my like, and I was being marched up and down

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Speaker 4: these aisles. And then you know, in the silence, someone

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Speaker 4: screamed freak and then the and then twelve hundred people laughed,

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Speaker 4: and I'd say that was the basis of my high school.

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Speaker 4: And I started skipping, and I started going to like

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Speaker 4: more and more shows and not really knowing where to

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Speaker 4: go and what to be and what to do. And

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Speaker 4: luckily these girls came up to me in the hallway

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Speaker 4: and they were like, hey, you go to all those shows, right,

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Speaker 4: but aren't you in the choir because I had found

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Speaker 4: the choir at that school. And I was like, yeah,

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Speaker 4: I'm in the choir and I go to all the shows.

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Speaker 4: And they're like, well, we need a singer for our band.

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Speaker 4: Do you wanna do you want to join in our band?

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Speaker 4: And I was like, without that, I have no idea

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Speaker 4: where I would have ended up. And then I transferred

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Speaker 4: myself to an alternative school and I didn't tell my mom,

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Speaker 4: didn't even know, you know, it was like maybe many

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Speaker 4: months in the school contacted her and said, Leslie's expelled.

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Speaker 4: She hasn't shown up, and my mom was like, assumed

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Speaker 4: I was just completely and I was like, no, no, no,

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Speaker 4: I just didn't tell you because I knew you would

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Speaker 4: probably make it even harder for me to just pull

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Speaker 4: this off. So I just did it. And I was

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Speaker 4: at this alternative school and I was in this band

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Speaker 4: and like, you know, kind of turned that frown upside

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Speaker 4: down sort of thing through the support of like genuine

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Speaker 4: community did.

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Speaker 2: You tell your parents about the incident with the being handcuffed.

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Speaker 4: Yes, my mom, I didn't live with my dad was

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Speaker 4: across the country, but yeah, I told my mom. And

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Speaker 4: I think that, you know, she had just watched her

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Speaker 4: daughter change so radically that she might have just been

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Speaker 4: so frustrated that like she you know, let's just say

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Speaker 4: that it's in recent years, I've recontextualized, hey ps. Nowadays,

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Speaker 4: luckily there's language to meet this type of moment that

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Speaker 4: at the time there was no language for. And I

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Speaker 4: can say that I'm grateful that now, like you know,

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Speaker 4: the gradations of experience that any single word can carry

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Speaker 4: within it is now at least available to be evoked

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Speaker 4: when it needs to be because that principle, you know,

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Speaker 4: like I can still get angry. I can still think

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Speaker 4: I need to find out who that was. I need

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Speaker 4: to write an open letter to that school letting them

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Speaker 4: know how. You know, they might be like, ooh, will

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Speaker 4: you come speak at our graduation. It's like, well, I

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Speaker 4: might have something to say that you don't necessarily want

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Speaker 4: to hear, but it was a different time, and not

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Speaker 4: to excuse it, but I can say that, like it

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Speaker 4: just we all know it to be true, it was

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Speaker 4: a different time. There was no vocabulary around this, and

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Speaker 4: without that, I don't know where I would be. And

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Speaker 4: so it's like anything that that helps you grow or

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Speaker 4: causes you to have to unavoidably find some interior basis

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Speaker 4: for understanding, and you can cave into bitterness or you

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Speaker 4: can you know, and I'm sure I had many years

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Speaker 4: of caving into bitterness, but something else rose from it

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Speaker 4: that I'm grateful for.

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Speaker 2: When did you start writing songs?

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Speaker 4: Well, in that band, I suppose was the beginning of songwriting,

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Speaker 4: even though we were doing it together. It was baby

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Speaker 4: steps in lyrics and you know who's the narrator? Is

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Speaker 4: this first person? Is this dream sequence? Is this stream

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Speaker 4: of consciousness? Or just you know, melody? But it was

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Speaker 4: a hardcore band, so ultimately our main asset was volume

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Speaker 4: and yeah, and melody came a lot later. I mean

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Speaker 4: there was melody I suppose at that time, but it

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Speaker 4: was mostly I didn't play guitar. I just was the

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Speaker 4: front person and I and volume was you know, kind

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Speaker 4: of where what I leaned on. And yeah, so many

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Speaker 4: years later, after I blew my voice out on tour

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Speaker 4: with that band, like just from screaming, I ended up

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Speaker 4: kind of under doctor's orders to you know, stay silent.

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Speaker 4: I had nodes. I had the whole that period of regenerating,

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Speaker 4: and I learned. I kind of taught myself to begin

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Speaker 4: to play guitar at that time when I when I

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Speaker 4: was in this sort of imposed silence and I'd had

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Speaker 4: to quit the band. I'd moved to Toronto. I you know,

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Speaker 4: I was living in my dad's basement and just like

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Speaker 4: kind of dealing with my first dose of isolation. And

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Speaker 4: what I found there was you know, melody essentially.

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Speaker 2: Do you remember some of the first songs you wrote

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Speaker 2: once you started playing guitar.

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Speaker 4: Yeah. I also had this thing called a melodica, which

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Speaker 4: is kind of like a wooden boxed miniature xylophone that

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Speaker 4: I was really and also had a four track. My

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Speaker 4: dad had given me a cassette four track a task

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Speaker 4: am and I had started with layers and singing harmonies

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Speaker 4: and making these long overtones with the metallophone, and I

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Speaker 4: kind of maybe something like sound sculptures using the radio,

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Speaker 4: using interference and just kind of playing with the form,

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Speaker 4: and like maybe the first songs they wrote the kind

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Speaker 4: of clunky first you know, broad strokes attempts were you know,

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Speaker 4: it's like now I listen to them and it's like

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Speaker 4: the touching yearbook photo kind of thing.

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Speaker 2: Where do you identify with any of the lyrics?

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Speaker 4: Still, maybe there was a there was a kind of

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Speaker 4: a sensibility and interest in metaphor already. Was there a

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Speaker 4: kind of wordplay? You know? I can hear now the

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Speaker 4: kind of grandfathered in sort of tendencies to like how

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Speaker 4: to speak around a subject rather than directly to it. Yeah,

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Speaker 4: I guess I wouldn't like sit and like probably cover

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Speaker 4: any of I would say, n see, I'm even calling

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Speaker 4: it covering, like as if it's not my own.

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Speaker 2: That's so interesting a former self, Yeah, exactly.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, I probably wouldn't cover her songs, but I can

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Speaker 4: appreciate that there's some DNA there.

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Speaker 3: We're going to take a quick break and then come

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Speaker 3: back with more from Leo Rose and Feist. We're back

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Speaker 3: with Leo Rose and Feist.

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Speaker 2: What do you think that you do as a songwriter

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Speaker 2: as a performer? What do you think you do especially

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Speaker 2: well or what are you the best at?

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Speaker 4: That's a nice question. I don't know that I can

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Speaker 4: really characterize it in words. There's like a location in

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Speaker 4: me that is interested in all sorts of variables and

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Speaker 4: how they cross over, and maybe I on this record

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Speaker 4: in particular, I was interested in kind of unseating some

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Speaker 4: of my tendencies and seeing what might be behind them. And there's,

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Speaker 4: maybe for the first time in my life, an awareness

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Speaker 4: that there's a kind of a rigor and a craft

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Speaker 4: and an interest in craft that I wouldn't have known

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Speaker 4: with my frontal lobe previously, I wouldn't have really thought

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Speaker 4: that's what I'm doing. But I'm kind of I continue

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Speaker 4: to learn from what came before, Like everything I've done

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Speaker 4: previously is sort of composted into the new body of work,

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Speaker 4: and I've can I can say to people I'm working with,

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Speaker 4: like this feels a little bit like mush of Boom's

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Speaker 4: great granddaughter or something like there's some there's some DNA,

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Speaker 4: there's something in here that is or like if Century

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Speaker 4: and Sea Lion had had a love child, that might be,

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Speaker 4: you know, a bort of Trouble or something like that.

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Speaker 4: Or but yeah, so there's a lineage maybe in what

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Speaker 4: I've made so far that that makes me curious about

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Speaker 4: what will come next or how that perspective will continue

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Speaker 4: to be interesting.

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Speaker 2: Do you feel like the character that you've created, or

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Speaker 2: do you feel like there even is a character that

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Speaker 2: you've created through your work? And if so, is that

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Speaker 2: person you or is it similar to you? Or does

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Speaker 2: that make sense?

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Speaker 4: It does? It does? It makes more sense now than ever.

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Speaker 4: I feel like an alignment has occurred where I now

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Speaker 4: know I owe nothing to the avatar, you know, the

351
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Speaker 4: thing that is refracted by this particular light that's shined

352
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Speaker 4: on this thing I do society that our society shines

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Speaker 4: this particular timbre of light is quality of light on

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Speaker 4: what I do, and it refracts out beyond me and

355
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Speaker 4: in some cases maybe leans a little bit too much

356
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Speaker 4: importance on it in a way that is on the surface.

357
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Speaker 4: I've learned that my investment in this very private conversation

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Speaker 4: with myself, yeah, and my voice being like literally and

359
00:21:01,800 --> 00:21:05,480
Speaker 4: then part of my anatomy that over many years I

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Speaker 4: learned to listen to from the inside rather than from

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Speaker 4: the outside. And and so it's kind of like I've

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Speaker 4: never thought about this before, but imagine like a you know,

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Speaker 4: like how a door knob reaches through a door, and

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Speaker 4: on one side you can turn it to go in,

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Speaker 4: and on the other side you can turn it to

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Speaker 4: go out, And those are two different gestures, but there

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Speaker 4: is the same portal. It's the same desire to move through.

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Speaker 4: And so my voice or the way I've chosen to

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Speaker 4: try to formulate not this not only the sound or

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Speaker 4: the expression of it, but the words that it's encants.

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Speaker 4: I now acknowledge and I feel comfortable in knowing that

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Speaker 4: that part is it's as much me as it is

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Speaker 4: what it becomes in someone else's listening, you know. So

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Speaker 4: it's and that's the part that I feel doesn't get

375
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Speaker 4: refracted and like it's not like a house of mirrors

376
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Speaker 4: where that can't be changed by the perception of it.

377
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Speaker 4: Because if my privacy goes into someone else's privacy, it's

378
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Speaker 4: like a you know, it's like hermetically sealed. It's safe. Yeah,

379
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Speaker 4: it's kind of there is a safety to it. And

380
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Speaker 4: I feel as I lean deeper into myself, into the

381
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Speaker 4: discomfort of my like continual daily misunderstanding of myself and

382
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Speaker 4: just trying to align to some personal responsibility, that's kind

383
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Speaker 4: of a north star that is looking for different these dimensions.

384
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Speaker 4: I'm hoping to find out how to be fed by them,

385
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Speaker 4: because I'm increasingly depleted and I'm realizing my like psychic

386
00:22:38,440 --> 00:22:42,280
Speaker 4: organism cannot sustain often how much I'm attempting to be

387
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Speaker 4: and do into how many people into It's like I'm

388
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Speaker 4: never quite solving for X. It's just like every single day,

389
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Speaker 4: I'm like, I can't find X. I can't solve for X.

390
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Speaker 4: And yet then these songs weirdly are a place where

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Speaker 4: I think I can because I can pause time and

392
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Speaker 4: I can give myself just like a little a little

393
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Speaker 4: navigation somehow.

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Speaker 2: Is there anything on the album that you feel like

395
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Speaker 2: you did solve, like any feelings that you either came

396
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Speaker 2: to terms with or you were able to articulate.

397
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Speaker 4: There was sort of like a secondary you know, because

398
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Speaker 4: I somehow wrote these songs through like this this really

399
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Speaker 4: difficult time, and I think I managed in that time

400
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Speaker 4: to kind of make myself evoke or lean into also

401
00:23:31,800 --> 00:23:36,960
Speaker 4: the responsibility to find the joy or to you know,

402
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Speaker 4: like be a little bit of a solar panel and

403
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Speaker 4: face the light and be energized by these things that

404
00:23:41,880 --> 00:23:45,520
Speaker 4: I'm learning or the relationships that you know, just help

405
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Speaker 4: me keep the horizon insight and not get completely lost,

406
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Speaker 4: you know. Yeah, And so weirdly, you know, you'd think

407
00:23:53,160 --> 00:23:55,520
Speaker 4: songs are you're saying something out loud as if you

408
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Speaker 4: know something, And so I the record was kind of

409
00:24:01,040 --> 00:24:04,040
Speaker 4: you know, no longer just in my within my reach,

410
00:24:04,119 --> 00:24:06,240
Speaker 4: like I'm still changing it, I'm still mixing it. I'm

411
00:24:06,280 --> 00:24:08,680
Speaker 4: still working on it. And now it's like at once,

412
00:24:08,840 --> 00:24:10,679
Speaker 4: you know, from one day to the next. Now it's

413
00:24:10,960 --> 00:24:14,240
Speaker 4: it's out, or at least it's out of my it's sealed.

414
00:24:14,240 --> 00:24:16,879
Speaker 4: It's done. It's like with a wax seal is like boop.

415
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Speaker 4: And there was sort of the secondary wave of a

416
00:24:20,240 --> 00:24:22,359
Speaker 4: discomfort and a kind of grief because I'm like, oh

417
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Speaker 4: my god, like I don't feel any better. It's like

418
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Speaker 4: maybe I could have well, I mean not to say

419
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Speaker 4: I mean every day I feel a range of reality,

420
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Speaker 4: but maybe even I thought that these songs could solve

421
00:24:38,880 --> 00:24:41,960
Speaker 4: something for me, or they could make something a little

422
00:24:42,000 --> 00:24:46,919
Speaker 4: easier or something. But the problems remain very much alive,

423
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Speaker 4: you know, the kind of shape shifting required, like the

424
00:24:50,720 --> 00:24:53,120
Speaker 4: woman who became a mother wasn't useful as a mother,

425
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Speaker 4: and now I need to become someone else to be

426
00:24:55,000 --> 00:24:59,320
Speaker 4: able to be that mother. It's also the daughter who

427
00:24:59,359 --> 00:25:04,760
Speaker 4: lost your father, Like these things are the adultification is ongoing,

428
00:25:05,480 --> 00:25:09,320
Speaker 4: and so to answer your question, maybe I think I

429
00:25:09,440 --> 00:25:11,800
Speaker 4: caught a kind of hope, you know, like it's there

430
00:25:11,880 --> 00:25:16,679
Speaker 4: is some optimism. I learned years ago that whatever I sing,

431
00:25:16,960 --> 00:25:21,199
Speaker 4: and in the repetition of it, I can find myself

432
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Speaker 4: making it true and truer, like whatever you look at

433
00:25:25,960 --> 00:25:29,560
Speaker 4: becomes you see it. And so if I'm looking to

434
00:25:29,600 --> 00:25:32,080
Speaker 4: see more hope or more optimism or more like I'm

435
00:25:32,080 --> 00:25:36,080
Speaker 4: trying to like collect the little crumbs of clarity put

436
00:25:36,080 --> 00:25:39,240
Speaker 4: my puzzle together, that maybe is what I think I

437
00:25:40,280 --> 00:25:44,560
Speaker 4: found Indie songs. And even as I say all this,

438
00:25:44,640 --> 00:25:47,000
Speaker 4: I feel a bit absurd because this is that self

439
00:25:47,040 --> 00:25:50,040
Speaker 4: mythologizing I was talking about. But it's important to me,

440
00:25:50,400 --> 00:25:52,400
Speaker 4: I'd say, it's more important to me than anyone else,

441
00:25:52,480 --> 00:25:55,439
Speaker 4: because this is what I This is the form I

442
00:25:55,520 --> 00:25:59,000
Speaker 4: use to try to unpack and understand what's what's going

443
00:25:59,040 --> 00:25:59,600
Speaker 4: on in there?

444
00:26:00,760 --> 00:26:05,840
Speaker 2: Right, And just speaking of having the feeling that nothing

445
00:26:05,880 --> 00:26:12,159
Speaker 2: has changed after accomplishing something, have you had the experience of, like,

446
00:26:12,240 --> 00:26:15,400
Speaker 2: as you've gotten more successful or as you've experienced success

447
00:26:15,440 --> 00:26:18,520
Speaker 2: over the course of your career, did you ever have

448
00:26:18,880 --> 00:26:22,720
Speaker 2: the thought that when you reached a certain place of

449
00:26:22,880 --> 00:26:25,520
Speaker 2: success or fame or whatever it is, that some of

450
00:26:25,520 --> 00:26:27,760
Speaker 2: those problems would go away.

451
00:26:28,440 --> 00:26:31,480
Speaker 4: I don't think that I ever had a fixed destination

452
00:26:31,600 --> 00:26:34,959
Speaker 4: in mind or edward or was it within, you know,

453
00:26:35,000 --> 00:26:37,439
Speaker 4: maybe the illusion that I could make anything easier. But

454
00:26:37,760 --> 00:26:40,800
Speaker 4: I will say that something, something that led to some

455
00:26:40,880 --> 00:26:44,719
Speaker 4: of this cracking open was precipitated by going to that

456
00:26:44,720 --> 00:26:46,719
Speaker 4: people festival. I don't know if you've heard about it,

457
00:26:46,760 --> 00:26:50,720
Speaker 4: but it was a festival in Berlin that was curated

458
00:26:51,080 --> 00:26:53,520
Speaker 4: or the context of it, which was created by Justin

459
00:26:53,640 --> 00:26:58,879
Speaker 4: Vernon and the Desert Brothers of the National Aaron and Brice,

460
00:26:59,320 --> 00:27:02,000
Speaker 4: and they created a festival and invited me to it,

461
00:27:02,040 --> 00:27:04,080
Speaker 4: and they kind of tried. I think they invited me

462
00:27:04,119 --> 00:27:06,840
Speaker 4: a few years and I didn't quite have the ears

463
00:27:06,880 --> 00:27:09,600
Speaker 4: to hear what they were saying until I was ready

464
00:27:09,640 --> 00:27:12,480
Speaker 4: to hear what they were saying, which is, we really

465
00:27:12,560 --> 00:27:16,000
Speaker 4: want to create a situation where people step outside of

466
00:27:16,000 --> 00:27:19,520
Speaker 4: their own expectations of themselves and find something new. What

467
00:27:19,560 --> 00:27:22,399
Speaker 4: they do is they invite, like in this one in Berlin,

468
00:27:22,480 --> 00:27:24,760
Speaker 4: there was like a three hundred people, and in each

469
00:27:24,840 --> 00:27:27,479
Speaker 4: case it was someone they kind of knew concentric circle,

470
00:27:27,680 --> 00:27:30,439
Speaker 4: like you know, a few radiations out from them, or

471
00:27:30,760 --> 00:27:33,280
Speaker 4: old friends like we're old friends, and Justin and I

472
00:27:33,320 --> 00:27:36,439
Speaker 4: are old friends. And they take people out of their

473
00:27:37,000 --> 00:27:40,359
Speaker 4: comfort zone in sense like not not you and your

474
00:27:40,400 --> 00:27:42,479
Speaker 4: drummer and your bass player and your tour manager and

475
00:27:42,520 --> 00:27:45,840
Speaker 4: you're you're in your monitors person or or something. It's

476
00:27:45,920 --> 00:27:48,560
Speaker 4: just you or the bass player from that band, or

477
00:27:48,560 --> 00:27:51,240
Speaker 4: the drummer from that band, or the guy who wrote

478
00:27:51,240 --> 00:27:54,760
Speaker 4: the libretto for that opera, that poet or that choreographer,

479
00:27:54,880 --> 00:27:59,240
Speaker 4: or that the trumpet player musical director for Paul Simon's band,

480
00:27:59,320 --> 00:28:03,320
Speaker 4: that you know, just all these individuals who possibly have

481
00:28:03,760 --> 00:28:06,040
Speaker 4: knit themselves very closely with the people that they've been

482
00:28:06,080 --> 00:28:09,280
Speaker 4: in collaboration with for many, many years, and as I

483
00:28:09,440 --> 00:28:13,280
Speaker 4: had done with my immediate family. And then they just

484
00:28:13,359 --> 00:28:16,560
Speaker 4: put us all in a hotel in Berlin with food

485
00:28:16,600 --> 00:28:18,320
Speaker 4: and drinks, kind of like we were joking, it's like

486
00:28:18,359 --> 00:28:21,800
Speaker 4: being at a really nice wedding. And then they took

487
00:28:21,800 --> 00:28:26,320
Speaker 4: over this campus called the Funk House, which is an

488
00:28:26,440 --> 00:28:32,240
Speaker 4: old radio kind of a Soviet era giant radio station

489
00:28:32,440 --> 00:28:35,760
Speaker 4: with many studios in it, and we would go between

490
00:28:35,800 --> 00:28:40,080
Speaker 4: the campus and the hotel and the ideas everyone's supposed

491
00:28:40,080 --> 00:28:42,680
Speaker 4: to for five days cultivate kind of like I don't

492
00:28:42,800 --> 00:28:45,880
Speaker 4: have an idea, do you what should we do? But

493
00:28:45,920 --> 00:28:49,720
Speaker 4: tickets have already been sold for Saturday Sunday to thousands

494
00:28:49,760 --> 00:28:53,320
Speaker 4: of people coming who don't know who's there. They didn't

495
00:28:53,320 --> 00:28:55,680
Speaker 4: buy the tickets knowing who's going to be at the festival.

496
00:28:55,680 --> 00:29:00,440
Speaker 4: They just know that this people festival invites people and

497
00:29:00,080 --> 00:29:03,040
Speaker 4: then something will occur as a result. And it was

498
00:29:03,120 --> 00:29:06,440
Speaker 4: just the most remarkable thing. It was just I reconnected

499
00:29:06,440 --> 00:29:08,680
Speaker 4: with the kings of convenience there, who I hadn't played

500
00:29:08,680 --> 00:29:13,000
Speaker 4: with for years. I created an improvisation project with Todd

501
00:29:13,080 --> 00:29:16,960
Speaker 4: Dhlhoff and Shazzad Is Maley based upon Emily Wilson's translation

502
00:29:17,000 --> 00:29:19,960
Speaker 4: of the Odyssey. I mean just literally because I had

503
00:29:19,960 --> 00:29:22,360
Speaker 4: it at dinner one night, the book that I was reading,

504
00:29:22,360 --> 00:29:24,080
Speaker 4: and Shaza said, what's that? And I was like, you

505
00:29:24,080 --> 00:29:26,120
Speaker 4: wouldn't believe this book. You just flip it open in

506
00:29:26,160 --> 00:29:30,800
Speaker 4: any phrase from this ancient Greek. This woman made it

507
00:29:30,840 --> 00:29:35,120
Speaker 4: read so readable, so relatable and anything could be sung.

508
00:29:35,120 --> 00:29:37,240
Speaker 4: And He's like, hey, well then let's do that. Let's

509
00:29:37,280 --> 00:29:41,920
Speaker 4: ask Mary, the creative director, Mary Hickson, to give us

510
00:29:41,920 --> 00:29:44,520
Speaker 4: space and give us an hour. And that's what she did.

511
00:29:44,560 --> 00:29:47,760
Speaker 4: She would she would have kind of in this enormous

512
00:29:47,760 --> 00:29:50,959
Speaker 4: spreadsheet the size of a room. She was moving people's

513
00:29:51,040 --> 00:29:55,520
Speaker 4: names around through the rooms available and helping people find

514
00:29:55,880 --> 00:29:59,560
Speaker 4: ways to incubate new projects. And then programmed this entire

515
00:29:59,600 --> 00:30:01,760
Speaker 4: festival on the fly so that when the audience came,

516
00:30:02,640 --> 00:30:05,560
Speaker 4: they all each member, each person who came. I think

517
00:30:05,600 --> 00:30:08,240
Speaker 4: they divided these thousands of people up into ten groups.

518
00:30:08,280 --> 00:30:11,120
Speaker 4: They all got wriskbands it said number one, number two,

519
00:30:11,200 --> 00:30:13,680
Speaker 4: number three, and there was a different itinerary for each

520
00:30:13,760 --> 00:30:16,120
Speaker 4: group of people, so they would be brought from room

521
00:30:16,160 --> 00:30:18,880
Speaker 4: to room to room in twenty minute to forty minute

522
00:30:18,920 --> 00:30:21,600
Speaker 4: increments and see these projects that were just being born

523
00:30:21,680 --> 00:30:22,160
Speaker 4: on the fly.

524
00:30:22,960 --> 00:30:24,320
Speaker 2: And that is so cool.

525
00:30:24,440 --> 00:30:26,840
Speaker 4: It was so cool. And I guess what I'm saying

526
00:30:27,080 --> 00:30:30,280
Speaker 4: is that that was to answer your question with the

527
00:30:30,280 --> 00:30:33,400
Speaker 4: longest answer of all time through history, is is it

528
00:30:33,480 --> 00:30:35,160
Speaker 4: was a kind of a I called it like a

529
00:30:35,200 --> 00:30:39,240
Speaker 4: mid career detox or something, because it was it was

530
00:30:39,320 --> 00:30:42,400
Speaker 4: a way to strip myself of all of the rules

531
00:30:42,440 --> 00:30:45,440
Speaker 4: that I'd come up with that they were like collated

532
00:30:45,480 --> 00:30:48,640
Speaker 4: over invisibly over time. Like Okay, I don't I shouldn't

533
00:30:48,680 --> 00:30:50,640
Speaker 4: do that anymore because that didn't work. Okay, So now

534
00:30:50,640 --> 00:30:54,400
Speaker 4: I have rule number one. Now, I shouldn't play multiple

535
00:30:54,640 --> 00:30:56,880
Speaker 4: shows in the same city because it seems that by

536
00:30:56,920 --> 00:30:59,160
Speaker 4: the third show it's change and it doesn't feel right,

537
00:30:59,240 --> 00:31:03,320
Speaker 4: So okay, multiples or like, technically I should use my

538
00:31:03,360 --> 00:31:05,440
Speaker 4: pedal chain this way because that's the way that seems

539
00:31:05,480 --> 00:31:07,520
Speaker 4: to work best. I should use my And I had

540
00:31:07,720 --> 00:31:11,920
Speaker 4: kind of collected this armature of all of these things

541
00:31:12,000 --> 00:31:14,920
Speaker 4: that I knew in air quotes because I what it

542
00:31:15,000 --> 00:31:18,040
Speaker 4: was was I was just limiting myself. I created all

543
00:31:18,080 --> 00:31:20,560
Speaker 4: these conditions that kind of disempowered me at the core

544
00:31:20,920 --> 00:31:23,160
Speaker 4: where I thought that I could only be what I

545
00:31:23,200 --> 00:31:25,760
Speaker 4: am and do what I do if these conditions were

546
00:31:25,760 --> 00:31:29,080
Speaker 4: in place. And so slowly, slowly, slowly, I lost my

547
00:31:30,000 --> 00:31:34,720
Speaker 4: scissor kicking punk clarity, a vision, and I became like

548
00:31:34,800 --> 00:31:38,480
Speaker 4: a professional who in the in that transition kind of

549
00:31:38,480 --> 00:31:44,160
Speaker 4: lost access to like the primary energetic truth surge that

550
00:31:44,240 --> 00:31:47,440
Speaker 4: it makes sound out of my body, you know, and

551
00:31:47,520 --> 00:31:51,840
Speaker 4: that people festival. Really it just gave me this feeling

552
00:31:51,960 --> 00:31:55,520
Speaker 4: of being like at Summer Camp, like you know every

553
00:31:55,520 --> 00:31:58,719
Speaker 4: single person there, and these are people who have achieved tenure,

554
00:31:58,800 --> 00:32:01,680
Speaker 4: Like we've all been touring for twenty years, and everyone's

555
00:32:01,720 --> 00:32:04,440
Speaker 4: walking into the cafeteria equivalent and be like, I don't

556
00:32:04,440 --> 00:32:05,320
Speaker 4: know anyone.

557
00:32:05,040 --> 00:32:07,680
Speaker 2: Here, like who must be so humbling?

558
00:32:07,800 --> 00:32:09,800
Speaker 4: Yeah? Can I sit with you guys like that kind

559
00:32:09,880 --> 00:32:13,360
Speaker 4: of thing, and everyone is feeling that, and yeah, it

560
00:32:13,400 --> 00:32:17,360
Speaker 4: was a really remarkable experience. It really changed everything for me.

561
00:32:18,600 --> 00:32:21,120
Speaker 3: We're taking one last quick break and then coming back

562
00:32:21,160 --> 00:32:28,720
Speaker 3: with more from Leo Rose and Feist. We're back with

563
00:32:28,760 --> 00:32:32,080
Speaker 3: the rest of Leo Rose's interview with Feist.

564
00:32:32,480 --> 00:32:35,600
Speaker 2: There's a certain threshold that all of us have for

565
00:32:35,960 --> 00:32:39,200
Speaker 2: letting something new in. When you're listening to new music

566
00:32:39,280 --> 00:32:41,640
Speaker 2: or a new artist or a new genre or whatever

567
00:32:41,720 --> 00:32:45,120
Speaker 2: it is. Does that happen for you with your own music?

568
00:32:45,800 --> 00:32:46,120
Speaker 4: How so?

569
00:32:46,800 --> 00:32:50,400
Speaker 2: Like do you have to hear something maybe like ten times,

570
00:32:50,520 --> 00:32:52,920
Speaker 2: or sing something a bunch of times, or hear even

571
00:32:52,960 --> 00:32:55,280
Speaker 2: if it's just a track, hear it a bunch of

572
00:32:55,280 --> 00:32:56,440
Speaker 2: times before it sticks.

573
00:32:57,320 --> 00:33:00,960
Speaker 4: You Know, It's funny because I I just listened last

574
00:33:01,040 --> 00:33:05,320
Speaker 4: night on a long nighttime drive to pod I Love

575
00:33:05,360 --> 00:33:10,640
Speaker 4: on Being. I'm sure you say, yeah, well, she's she's

576
00:33:10,680 --> 00:33:14,320
Speaker 4: wonderful and she's so great. Yeah, I'm sure it's doing

577
00:33:14,320 --> 00:33:17,720
Speaker 4: what you do. You must feel like you identify with

578
00:33:17,760 --> 00:33:21,200
Speaker 4: her or something that it's to conduct an interview, you know, which,

579
00:33:21,240 --> 00:33:24,240
Speaker 4: by the way, you're doing really beautifully, so thank you.

580
00:33:24,840 --> 00:33:27,560
Speaker 4: But but she interviewed Rick Rubin. I don't know if

581
00:33:27,600 --> 00:33:29,760
Speaker 4: you heard that one, that is, I did it. It's

582
00:33:29,800 --> 00:33:32,560
Speaker 4: like it's recent and it's not often that she interviews

583
00:33:32,600 --> 00:33:35,680
Speaker 4: anybody from anywhere close to I mean, not that i'd

584
00:33:35,680 --> 00:33:38,360
Speaker 4: say I'm close to anywhere close to what Rick Rubin's accomplished,

585
00:33:38,400 --> 00:33:40,920
Speaker 4: but in the sense that I don't really hear her

586
00:33:40,960 --> 00:33:45,000
Speaker 4: speaking to people who make art. It's more people whose

587
00:33:45,320 --> 00:33:47,239
Speaker 4: life as they live it is in a way art

588
00:33:47,320 --> 00:33:51,720
Speaker 4: or writers or you know, theologians, or I mean, just

589
00:33:51,760 --> 00:33:53,720
Speaker 4: people from all walks of life, but not often like

590
00:33:54,400 --> 00:33:57,480
Speaker 4: a record producer or a musician, you know, because we're

591
00:33:57,520 --> 00:34:00,000
Speaker 4: kind of like the low art on the art spectrum

592
00:34:00,120 --> 00:34:03,320
Speaker 4: or something. You know. Yeah, but he really he said

593
00:34:03,360 --> 00:34:06,080
Speaker 4: something that I really liked, which was she was admitting

594
00:34:06,160 --> 00:34:09,160
Speaker 4: that though she speaks with writers all the time and

595
00:34:09,200 --> 00:34:11,799
Speaker 4: she's trying to cultivate her own practice of writing and

596
00:34:12,400 --> 00:34:15,920
Speaker 4: make space for that, and that it's that when she

597
00:34:16,040 --> 00:34:18,080
Speaker 4: sits in front of the page, she's kind of just

598
00:34:18,160 --> 00:34:22,040
Speaker 4: tortured and having such a difficult time. And I found

599
00:34:22,080 --> 00:34:25,400
Speaker 4: that so touching, because that's I don't know that anyone

600
00:34:25,440 --> 00:34:28,479
Speaker 4: gets to bypass that part of it, the self loath,

601
00:34:28,640 --> 00:34:33,000
Speaker 4: the self loathing, the you know, imposture syndrome sort of thing.

602
00:34:33,080 --> 00:34:36,960
Speaker 4: But he said, well, it's because if you're the writer

603
00:34:37,480 --> 00:34:40,360
Speaker 4: and the reader in the same instant, there's a cognitive

604
00:34:40,400 --> 00:34:45,000
Speaker 4: dissonance between the doing and the absorbing. So you've you've

605
00:34:45,440 --> 00:34:48,160
Speaker 4: squeezed it out of you and you're now you're immediately

606
00:34:48,160 --> 00:34:50,880
Speaker 4: absorbing it, and you're gonna you're going to taint the

607
00:34:50,920 --> 00:34:53,200
Speaker 4: reading with the writing of it because you're going to

608
00:34:53,280 --> 00:34:55,640
Speaker 4: be the writer reading it. And that's that those are

609
00:34:55,680 --> 00:34:58,920
Speaker 4: two different roles. And so here he gave great advice,

610
00:34:58,960 --> 00:35:01,920
Speaker 4: which was to just create a buffer and a separation

611
00:35:02,040 --> 00:35:06,399
Speaker 4: between those two halves of yourself and right right, right right,

612
00:35:06,680 --> 00:35:09,920
Speaker 4: as if it's a muscle you're exercising, and don't read anything,

613
00:35:10,280 --> 00:35:13,279
Speaker 4: and then maybe way later, when you're absolutely certain you

614
00:35:13,360 --> 00:35:16,080
Speaker 4: have no idea what's in that book, open it again,

615
00:35:16,160 --> 00:35:17,759
Speaker 4: and then you can be the reader and then you

616
00:35:17,800 --> 00:35:23,240
Speaker 4: can judge truly. So in writing, you know, in writing

617
00:35:23,360 --> 00:35:27,240
Speaker 4: these songs, what he said, I recognize it as something

618
00:35:27,239 --> 00:35:30,480
Speaker 4: I do. My mind is maybe not interested or patient

619
00:35:30,640 --> 00:35:34,920
Speaker 4: enough to really like, no melody can survive my scrutiny. Basically,

620
00:35:34,960 --> 00:35:37,960
Speaker 4: if I work on something too much on Tuesday, it's

621
00:35:37,960 --> 00:35:40,319
Speaker 4: sort of like dead to me by Wednesday, and I

622
00:35:40,320 --> 00:35:42,239
Speaker 4: don't care about it anymore because I feel like the

623
00:35:42,360 --> 00:35:47,160
Speaker 4: muse didn't play ball or something. Yeah, so the Song

624
00:35:47,200 --> 00:35:49,480
Speaker 4: a Day thing, you know, I don't think. I don't

625
00:35:49,480 --> 00:35:51,279
Speaker 4: think we spoke about that, But did we?

626
00:35:51,480 --> 00:35:52,920
Speaker 2: No, I want to ask you about that. I've heard

627
00:35:52,920 --> 00:35:55,799
Speaker 2: Maggie Rodgers talk about that about the group. Is that

628
00:35:55,840 --> 00:35:59,919
Speaker 2: what you're talking about? The writing group sort of like workshopping, Yeah,

629
00:36:00,719 --> 00:36:02,440
Speaker 2: songs and there was an assignment.

630
00:36:02,920 --> 00:36:06,719
Speaker 4: That's right. Yes, The Song a Day group is led

631
00:36:06,760 --> 00:36:10,680
Speaker 4: by our intrepid captain phil Winrobe, who's a producer out

632
00:36:10,680 --> 00:36:13,879
Speaker 4: of New York, and he created this game, I think

633
00:36:13,880 --> 00:36:15,920
Speaker 4: with Damien Rice. I think it was Damien and him

634
00:36:15,920 --> 00:36:19,400
Speaker 4: that first thought of it. So in that Rick Ruben

635
00:36:19,480 --> 00:36:23,160
Speaker 4: advice way of be the maker and then later be

636
00:36:23,239 --> 00:36:27,600
Speaker 4: the listener. I the Song A Day was this repetition

637
00:36:27,640 --> 00:36:30,319
Speaker 4: of like you have to qualify kind of in a

638
00:36:30,320 --> 00:36:33,160
Speaker 4: good natured way to stay in to not get booted,

639
00:36:34,480 --> 00:36:36,799
Speaker 4: because the consequence of not showing up on Monday is

640
00:36:36,800 --> 00:36:39,319
Speaker 4: like Okay, well then you're out, you know. Good. We

641
00:36:39,400 --> 00:36:42,799
Speaker 4: all love you, we all raise a toast to you,

642
00:36:42,960 --> 00:36:46,120
Speaker 4: but you're out, you know. But it's like all warm

643
00:36:46,160 --> 00:36:47,480
Speaker 4: and good nature. Yeah.

644
00:36:47,680 --> 00:36:49,719
Speaker 2: But it's good though, because it sounds like with the

645
00:36:50,239 --> 00:36:54,080
Speaker 2: People festival. Yeah, And that was sort of an assignment.

646
00:36:54,239 --> 00:36:56,640
Speaker 2: The Song a Day is sort of an assignment.

647
00:36:56,280 --> 00:37:00,239
Speaker 4: Yes, And because of the need to keep going, there

648
00:37:00,239 --> 00:37:02,200
Speaker 4: would be kind of at the end of the seven days,

649
00:37:02,960 --> 00:37:05,120
Speaker 4: I would maybe be aware that I caught a little

650
00:37:05,440 --> 00:37:08,279
Speaker 4: a few messages in a bottle, like something just came

651
00:37:08,440 --> 00:37:12,799
Speaker 4: clearly through, arrived intact. I managed to like lob it

652
00:37:12,840 --> 00:37:15,600
Speaker 4: out into the Song a Day community and then and

653
00:37:15,640 --> 00:37:18,520
Speaker 4: then I would kind of know that if I listen

654
00:37:18,600 --> 00:37:20,719
Speaker 4: back to these right now, I'm going to I'm going

655
00:37:20,800 --> 00:37:23,560
Speaker 4: to make them worse, I'm going to pick them apart, whatever.

656
00:37:23,600 --> 00:37:26,000
Speaker 4: But if I just wait a few months, like let

657
00:37:26,000 --> 00:37:29,080
Speaker 4: the compost start to regenerate the soil like this, let

658
00:37:29,120 --> 00:37:32,200
Speaker 4: it sit. It was really amazing because I did four

659
00:37:32,280 --> 00:37:35,600
Speaker 4: or five of these, and the group changed each time.

660
00:37:35,640 --> 00:37:37,000
Speaker 4: There was kind of like a few of us that

661
00:37:37,080 --> 00:37:40,400
Speaker 4: did everyone, and by the end there was you know,

662
00:37:40,560 --> 00:37:44,040
Speaker 4: twenty something songs from which this record was essentially born.

663
00:37:44,200 --> 00:37:46,960
Speaker 4: But I gave myself the distance between the doing and

664
00:37:47,040 --> 00:37:50,719
Speaker 4: the beginning to I don't know understand what amount of

665
00:37:50,719 --> 00:37:54,279
Speaker 4: reformulation any of them needed. I waited there was a

666
00:37:54,320 --> 00:37:57,200
Speaker 4: window between the doing and the and the kind of

667
00:37:57,239 --> 00:37:58,400
Speaker 4: working on them.

668
00:37:58,920 --> 00:38:00,400
Speaker 2: Are you working on any new music?

669
00:38:01,840 --> 00:38:04,960
Speaker 4: No, but I've had that kind of inclination, you know,

670
00:38:05,040 --> 00:38:08,239
Speaker 4: like a craving almost. It's it's sort of you know,

671
00:38:08,320 --> 00:38:09,880
Speaker 4: it's sort of like you never know that you're in

672
00:38:10,000 --> 00:38:13,240
Speaker 4: an epoch until you're out of it. Like I didn't

673
00:38:13,280 --> 00:38:18,040
Speaker 4: know in my twenties that moment was like actually a thing,

674
00:38:18,239 --> 00:38:20,720
Speaker 4: like it was a time I will be able to remember.

675
00:38:21,400 --> 00:38:25,200
Speaker 4: I never you never know when you're in the the

676
00:38:25,320 --> 00:38:28,640
Speaker 4: like moment of writing. It's kind of like until you notice,

677
00:38:28,640 --> 00:38:31,040
Speaker 4: Oh I haven't haven't felt that craving, haven't been in

678
00:38:31,080 --> 00:38:34,880
Speaker 4: that mind frame. I haven't like been receptive to that

679
00:38:34,920 --> 00:38:37,720
Speaker 4: for a while, you know. But honestly, finishing a record

680
00:38:37,880 --> 00:38:42,839
Speaker 4: is so obliteratingly like it's such a task that there

681
00:38:42,880 --> 00:38:45,080
Speaker 4: wasn't a lot of room. But maybe because it's done now,

682
00:38:45,080 --> 00:38:48,400
Speaker 4: I'm already starting to feel that craving. Yeah, so I

683
00:38:48,480 --> 00:38:52,319
Speaker 4: did ask Phil for another song a day because now

684
00:38:52,400 --> 00:38:56,239
Speaker 4: I feel I like being inside that it's a phantom community.

685
00:38:56,680 --> 00:38:59,560
Speaker 4: There's yeah, you know, one time in the pandemic, Adam

686
00:38:59,680 --> 00:39:03,760
Speaker 4: had every buddy to his yard for a very distant

687
00:39:03,920 --> 00:39:06,520
Speaker 4: you know, everyone had a picnic blanket like thirty feet

688
00:39:06,520 --> 00:39:09,880
Speaker 4: from each other and it was Amelia Meath from Silvaneso

689
00:39:10,200 --> 00:39:14,760
Speaker 4: and Beck and Maggie was there that time, and Adam

690
00:39:14,800 --> 00:39:17,120
Speaker 4: Cohen and you know, it's just like a mac DeMarco.

691
00:39:17,280 --> 00:39:19,960
Speaker 4: He did that one and it was the first time

692
00:39:19,960 --> 00:39:22,400
Speaker 4: we'd all you know, been together to say, is that

693
00:39:22,520 --> 00:39:24,719
Speaker 4: was pretty That's pretty cool that we get to do

694
00:39:24,800 --> 00:39:26,880
Speaker 4: that together but alone, you know.

695
00:39:27,840 --> 00:39:29,960
Speaker 2: So are people like sitting on their blanket and singing

696
00:39:30,000 --> 00:39:30,399
Speaker 2: their song?

697
00:39:30,600 --> 00:39:32,680
Speaker 4: No, not at all. We were just hanging like it

698
00:39:32,719 --> 00:39:35,239
Speaker 4: was song a day had happened. And it's such a

699
00:39:35,239 --> 00:39:38,040
Speaker 4: commitment and it's such a you know, our whole week

700
00:39:38,120 --> 00:39:40,880
Speaker 4: is pointed at this like very private exercise that we

701
00:39:40,960 --> 00:39:44,640
Speaker 4: know other people are having the same private exercise. You know,

702
00:39:45,080 --> 00:39:47,880
Speaker 4: maybe like cramming for an exam like everyone in your class.

703
00:39:48,160 --> 00:39:49,359
Speaker 2: That's what I just thought of too.

704
00:39:49,480 --> 00:39:52,160
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's like no one can get that information into

705
00:39:52,160 --> 00:39:54,520
Speaker 4: your brain but you but you know everyone's also doing it.

706
00:39:54,560 --> 00:39:59,200
Speaker 2: You know right, so it feels a little better in solidarity.

707
00:39:59,040 --> 00:40:02,000
Speaker 4: But I request another one and for my birthday this year.

708
00:40:02,080 --> 00:40:05,719
Speaker 4: Hilariously because on Valentine's Day, which is the day after

709
00:40:05,719 --> 00:40:08,080
Speaker 4: my birthday, the first songs came out, and then I

710
00:40:08,120 --> 00:40:11,200
Speaker 4: wrote Phil and said, hey, ps, these songs, for the

711
00:40:11,200 --> 00:40:13,680
Speaker 4: most part on this record came from what the opportunity

712
00:40:13,719 --> 00:40:16,160
Speaker 4: you gave me to like find them, so you're kind

713
00:40:16,200 --> 00:40:18,960
Speaker 4: of the godfather of this record. And he's like, okay,

714
00:40:19,000 --> 00:40:21,200
Speaker 4: well then happy birthday. Let's do another week and it

715
00:40:21,239 --> 00:40:23,000
Speaker 4: can be any week you want. So I picked the

716
00:40:23,000 --> 00:40:24,719
Speaker 4: week when I know I'm not on tour, when I

717
00:40:24,760 --> 00:40:26,960
Speaker 4: know I can get quiet, and we're going to do

718
00:40:26,960 --> 00:40:30,759
Speaker 4: another one in June, so that's that's awesome. Yeah. Yeah,

719
00:40:30,800 --> 00:40:33,120
Speaker 4: we've already started to like send out the invice, justin

720
00:40:33,239 --> 00:40:35,600
Speaker 4: Vernon wanted to do it, trying to think of some

721
00:40:35,680 --> 00:40:38,399
Speaker 4: other friends who have expressed interest and said, like, tell

722
00:40:38,400 --> 00:40:42,439
Speaker 4: me next time it's happening, and yeah, to get out

723
00:40:42,480 --> 00:40:45,280
Speaker 4: of our own way at this point and have Phil

724
00:40:46,080 --> 00:40:49,200
Speaker 4: and Damien create that context, it's such a gift totally.

725
00:40:49,920 --> 00:40:51,880
Speaker 2: Do you need to hear feedback from people when you

726
00:40:51,880 --> 00:40:54,120
Speaker 2: play something new, No.

727
00:40:54,160 --> 00:40:58,680
Speaker 4: I usually feel I'm better served to keep it real

728
00:40:58,760 --> 00:41:02,120
Speaker 4: tight until I'm until I'm pretty sure about where I'm

729
00:41:02,120 --> 00:41:06,360
Speaker 4: going with it. The development of those initial little embryos

730
00:41:06,400 --> 00:41:08,759
Speaker 4: that were found in Song a Day, it happened like

731
00:41:08,840 --> 00:41:11,680
Speaker 4: in an isolation beyond even usually I kind of self

732
00:41:11,719 --> 00:41:15,080
Speaker 4: isolate through the writing process, but I would show MACKI

733
00:41:15,440 --> 00:41:18,640
Speaker 4: or Gonzo. I would show certain friends, my really dear

734
00:41:18,680 --> 00:41:21,279
Speaker 4: friend in Toronto named Adriann, like she's just sort of

735
00:41:21,320 --> 00:41:24,360
Speaker 4: always been a witness. I kind of like she's always

736
00:41:24,400 --> 00:41:26,920
Speaker 4: like I believe you or I don't know if I

737
00:41:27,000 --> 00:41:30,879
Speaker 4: believe you. In this case, the closest collaborator I would

738
00:41:30,920 --> 00:41:33,239
Speaker 4: say through the writing process besides Song a Day was

739
00:41:33,320 --> 00:41:37,040
Speaker 4: I became pen pals with the director Mike Mills through

740
00:41:37,239 --> 00:41:41,160
Speaker 4: the pandemic and we were just sort of like this

741
00:41:41,320 --> 00:41:44,239
Speaker 4: epistolary ping pong game that was all about craft and

742
00:41:44,280 --> 00:41:46,120
Speaker 4: it was all about He was in the middle of

743
00:41:46,200 --> 00:41:50,160
Speaker 4: editing his new film Kaman Common that's since come out,

744
00:41:50,320 --> 00:41:54,080
Speaker 4: and I was in you know, kind of isolation Song

745
00:41:54,120 --> 00:41:58,120
Speaker 4: a Day, and like, it's really strange, but this friendship

746
00:41:58,120 --> 00:42:00,799
Speaker 4: bloomed right at the beginning of the pandemic and it

747
00:42:00,840 --> 00:42:04,240
Speaker 4: became kind of this like I don't know what accountability

748
00:42:04,480 --> 00:42:09,200
Speaker 4: centrifugue or something. Because there was someone curious listening, he

749
00:42:10,000 --> 00:42:15,000
Speaker 4: for whatever reason, got he received energy from other people's problems,

750
00:42:15,000 --> 00:42:17,080
Speaker 4: like he from solving kind of a problem other than

751
00:42:17,080 --> 00:42:20,240
Speaker 4: his edit. It seemed to always he'd bring something back

752
00:42:20,280 --> 00:42:24,200
Speaker 4: with him from coming into my into my little laboratory,

753
00:42:24,280 --> 00:42:26,360
Speaker 4: and then he'd leave and go back to what he

754
00:42:26,440 --> 00:42:28,880
Speaker 4: was working on. And similarly he'd send me screen grabs

755
00:42:28,960 --> 00:42:32,319
Speaker 4: or little bits of dialogue or something, and you know,

756
00:42:32,520 --> 00:42:35,040
Speaker 4: it was sort of we were activated by each other's

757
00:42:35,320 --> 00:42:38,240
Speaker 4: different form. Like I don't know, I don't know anything

758
00:42:38,239 --> 00:42:40,920
Speaker 4: about film, and he can. He considered music to be

759
00:42:41,040 --> 00:42:44,040
Speaker 4: like this playground that was not responsible to like a

760
00:42:44,040 --> 00:42:46,440
Speaker 4: two hour arc and character development and all of this

761
00:42:46,880 --> 00:42:49,920
Speaker 4: arduousness that comes with filmmaking. Yeah, he gave me a

762
00:42:49,920 --> 00:42:51,279
Speaker 4: lot of really cool homework too.

763
00:42:52,080 --> 00:42:52,920
Speaker 2: I'd very cool.

764
00:42:52,960 --> 00:42:55,680
Speaker 4: I'd send him an early song and you know he

765
00:42:55,760 --> 00:42:57,880
Speaker 4: would or like a song a day the day I

766
00:42:57,880 --> 00:42:59,600
Speaker 4: wrote it. I'd say I'd lob it over to him

767
00:42:59,600 --> 00:43:01,359
Speaker 4: and say like, this was my offering today, I feel

768
00:43:01,400 --> 00:43:04,719
Speaker 4: particularly good about it. And then he'd he'd have like

769
00:43:04,800 --> 00:43:07,239
Speaker 4: he was the only person I felt interested in crosstalk

770
00:43:07,320 --> 00:43:09,240
Speaker 4: from or in like input from.

771
00:43:09,480 --> 00:43:11,919
Speaker 2: What would he say, like what sort of feedback would

772
00:43:11,920 --> 00:43:12,319
Speaker 2: he give you?

773
00:43:13,080 --> 00:43:15,800
Speaker 4: He'd often say, can you put that in plain language,

774
00:43:17,320 --> 00:43:20,680
Speaker 4: like write your lyrics out and then underneath verse five,

775
00:43:20,960 --> 00:43:24,440
Speaker 4: verse line by line, or just like kind of summarize

776
00:43:24,480 --> 00:43:26,719
Speaker 4: each verse and what you're trying to what you're what

777
00:43:26,719 --> 00:43:29,120
Speaker 4: are you saying with that? Like what do you what

778
00:43:29,239 --> 00:43:32,520
Speaker 4: is the concrete thing you're you're getting at, because you

779
00:43:32,800 --> 00:43:35,000
Speaker 4: part of my thing is I like speaking around a thing.

780
00:43:35,440 --> 00:43:39,799
Speaker 4: I like creating the the image of what's inside in

781
00:43:39,880 --> 00:43:43,319
Speaker 4: relief kind of. And it's sort of like in the

782
00:43:43,480 --> 00:43:46,640
Speaker 4: in like casting ceramics or something. You make a mold

783
00:43:46,640 --> 00:43:48,799
Speaker 4: and then you pour something inside it, and when you

784
00:43:48,840 --> 00:43:51,200
Speaker 4: crack the mold off, there's the shape, like in a

785
00:43:51,200 --> 00:43:56,160
Speaker 4: way lyrically I like doing I like finding a shape

786
00:43:56,239 --> 00:43:58,799
Speaker 4: in relief, you know. So he would say, Okay, I

787
00:43:58,880 --> 00:44:01,240
Speaker 4: get that you're you're you're creating a shape and relief,

788
00:44:01,280 --> 00:44:03,279
Speaker 4: but now just describe to me what that shape is

789
00:44:03,800 --> 00:44:07,160
Speaker 4: and then go back and see if you can put

790
00:44:07,200 --> 00:44:08,560
Speaker 4: a little bit more of the clarity of what that

791
00:44:08,600 --> 00:44:10,959
Speaker 4: shape is inside. You know, this is a man who's very,

792
00:44:11,160 --> 00:44:14,560
Speaker 4: very good at narrative. You know. It was just so

793
00:44:15,239 --> 00:44:18,680
Speaker 4: helpful because I think I was also just trying to

794
00:44:18,880 --> 00:44:22,040
Speaker 4: find a way to be a little bit closer to

795
00:44:22,040 --> 00:44:24,919
Speaker 4: the quick. And I'd say that that influence from Mike

796
00:44:25,040 --> 00:44:29,680
Speaker 4: really found I found him in my mind's eye kind

797
00:44:29,680 --> 00:44:32,360
Speaker 4: of you know, he's a little angel on my shoulder

798
00:44:32,440 --> 00:44:34,920
Speaker 4: or saying that, Is there another way to say that,

799
00:44:35,160 --> 00:44:35,320
Speaker 4: you know?

800
00:44:35,440 --> 00:44:37,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I was going to ask you if there's

801
00:44:37,160 --> 00:44:39,440
Speaker 2: somebody in your mind while you're writing, but it sounds

802
00:44:39,520 --> 00:44:43,040
Speaker 2: like he was the little angel. He made that wonderful

803
00:44:43,120 --> 00:44:46,719
Speaker 2: movie with the film that he made for the National Yes,

804
00:44:47,280 --> 00:44:49,359
Speaker 2: and I think he got them unstuck as well.

805
00:44:49,560 --> 00:44:54,040
Speaker 4: Yes, exactly. And that's how we met, ironically because Aaron

806
00:44:54,080 --> 00:44:57,560
Speaker 4: and brace After people now we've all joined the same

807
00:44:57,600 --> 00:45:00,560
Speaker 4: cult essentially because of that what that Festial did for me.

808
00:45:01,160 --> 00:45:02,640
Speaker 4: And they asked if I would come and do the

809
00:45:02,719 --> 00:45:06,440
Speaker 4: Q and A for a screening for that film in Toronto.

810
00:45:06,680 --> 00:45:09,000
Speaker 4: So that's how I met Mike goes through that film,

811
00:45:09,040 --> 00:45:11,080
Speaker 4: which I found incredibly.

812
00:45:11,280 --> 00:45:14,239
Speaker 2: Powerful, so powerful, and I.

813
00:45:14,239 --> 00:45:16,040
Speaker 4: Hate to say it, but at this point I think

814
00:45:16,080 --> 00:45:18,920
Speaker 4: I'm incredibly late and I have to go on a

815
00:45:18,960 --> 00:45:21,360
Speaker 4: motherly errand to pick someone up if you know what

816
00:45:21,400 --> 00:45:21,839
Speaker 4: I'm saying.

817
00:45:22,600 --> 00:45:24,879
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, yes yes. Thank you so much for taking

818
00:45:24,920 --> 00:45:27,959
Speaker 2: the time to talk today. It was so much fun.

819
00:45:28,000 --> 00:45:29,160
Speaker 2: I'm loving your album.

820
00:45:29,719 --> 00:45:32,920
Speaker 4: Thank you. This has been such an interesting conversation and

821
00:45:33,000 --> 00:45:34,799
Speaker 4: it was really really nice to talk to you. I

822
00:45:34,840 --> 00:45:35,520
Speaker 4: appreciate it.

823
00:45:38,000 --> 00:45:42,239
Speaker 3: Thanks for talking through the inspiration for a new album, multitudes.

824
00:45:43,200 --> 00:45:45,640
Speaker 3: You can hear all of our favorite fight songs on

825
00:45:45,680 --> 00:45:49,719
Speaker 3: a playlist at broken record podcast dot com. You can

826
00:45:49,719 --> 00:45:53,400
Speaker 3: follow us on Twitter at broken record. Broken Record is

827
00:45:53,440 --> 00:45:57,200
Speaker 3: produced with help from Leah Rose, Jason Gambrell, Fantaliday, and

828
00:45:57,440 --> 00:46:01,800
Speaker 3: Eric Sandler. Our editor is Sophie. Broken Record is a

829
00:46:01,800 --> 00:46:04,839
Speaker 3: production of Pushkin Industries, and if you like the show,

830
00:46:04,920 --> 00:46:07,480
Speaker 3: please remember to share, rate, and review us on your

831
00:46:07,480 --> 00:46:11,200
Speaker 3: podcast app. I fee Music, Expect Kenny Beats, I'm justin

832
00:46:11,280 --> 00:46:11,600
Speaker 3: Mischan