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being on an indie label. The type of people that we
work with and the amount of people we work with is
very similar. We really haven’t experienced any nega-
tive things. Noone has told us anything like “hey | think
you’d look a lot cuter with green hair” or “I don’t hear a
single”. When we were recording, no one [from the
label] even came out and we actually got worried since
we didn’t hear from them at all. We thought, “shouldn't
there be some guy, in a robe, stroking his chin giving
the Caesar thumbs up”. We didn’t get any of that and
actually got worried and called and had them send
someone out.

Where did you record the last album?

In Northern California at this place called “Prairie Sun”
It's an old chicken hatchery that’s been converted into
a studio. It’s very rustic and it was sort of like living on
a farm for a month. Tom Waits actually recorded “Bone
Machine” and “Mule Variation’s” there. It had that rural
vibe with old rusting water heaters and pipes every-
where and big wooden rooms. It definitely got us far
away from our usual environment in Austin [Texas] and
being around our friends. It really put us in the head-
space to record.

| suppose you haven’t spent much time around
home recently.

We haven’t this year so far. | think in total this whole
year we spent like four weeks at home.

Is it true that the band is planning on creating a
short film to accompany the album?

Well, that was the original idea and the label was cool
with it. Then once all the touring started and the album
came out it became a crunch for both time and
resources so we decided that we would just do a video
for one of the songs and try to get back to the film-

 

© "ither press >>> CULTURE

making at a later date. The record came out and there
was a demand for a video which we weren't really pre-
pared for so we had to get on that.

Do you feel that on the new album the band
achieved what it was aiming for?

Yes. | think the other records would probably sound
more like this one if we always had the time and effort
to dedicate to it. For other albums we had to waste a
lot of our time and energy doing things like working in
a café. Our first two records were basically stolen. We
would sneak into studios at night because we didn’t
have any money. If we had a friend working at a studio
we would go in, set up and do it. This is the first record
that we actually paid for! We had our friend and long-
time collaborator Mike McCarthy work on this record as
Engineer and he also did a lot of producing. This is the
first time we have gotten to a point where we think oh,
a violin would sound good here, and we could actually
make that happen. Or if we hear a piano part, we could
actually pay someone a hundred dollars to tune the
piano so that it actually sounded decent in the song.

 

The new album has quite a mesh of background
instruments. Who plays them?

Well, we did most of it, except we hired a string quar-
tet for four of the songs.

Would | be correct in guessing that “Bladerunner”
is one of those songs?

| think the second engineer at the studio came in and
played some cello on that one. We also put a bunch of
weird instruments on the album. There’s a bass har-
monica which is this very bizarre dual-tiered piece of
metal and it’s so big that | really struggled with it. |
used it on “Relative Ways”. You could probably never
pick it out from the way it’s mixed but it’s in there. We
even used a flugelhorn on the record! Not too many
artists can boast that one!

All right. Well, hopefully when I speak to you next
time it will be on your Flugelhorn solo tour.
[laughing] sounds good.