UN: Crucial Blast released your debut full length release, Six, recently. Does it feel good to know that the label is excited about the album? Im sure most labels just see dollar signs, but Crucial Blast signed you guys due to being blown away by your sound. I don't think that happens very often these days.
Matt: Dude, we are very very stoked on the blast, absolutely. In our case, dollar signs dollar signs are completely irrelevant, cuz we don't make cents, so just knowing that the sound is what Adam was excited about makes me very very happy and encouraged!
UN: Six is definitely a roller coaster ride of sounds and moods. How long did it take to write the music for the album? Is it all worked out before hand or do you improvise in the studio at all?
Matt: Well, we wrote that music in sporadic bursts over the course of about a year, maybe twoish...I can't really remember anything. We were living in Boston at the time most of that was written. The roller coaster ride of life. Most definitely. Life is not a lady. So, life pulls you and spins you in certain ways, at all times, hence music...I'd say mostly everything was worked out ahead of time, structurally, but the studio thing is so fun that things must change, and certain problems must be conquered. Aaron Emmert recorded this album. He is our friend, It's fun to work with someone that understands what you are doing, has seen you perform live and that sort of thing so there's a ton of room for spontaneous creation. Like...dude, lets reverse this track, or add this overdub, or smoke sum reef and talk for a bit, or let's do two guitar tracks instead of five, you idiot! So however much you have a song worked out, in an environment as living as that, and as comfortable, things inevitably change, which is exciting.
UN: Is it tough to find someone to record the band that understands what you guys are all about musically? Im sure there are many producers that just wouldnt know what to make of the bands sound, which is definitely a good thing.
Matt: Oh shit, Im not looking ahead! I said some stuff about this up there. We lucked out, Aaron is a bro, and we've played with his band, Mammatus, quite a bit. He fully understands our sound, I believe, which gives us more trust in him. So if he suggests something, we feel comfortable considering it, and acting upon it, the idea. That being said, I think at this point, we would all do certain things differently, and will do for the next album. We want to sound more the way we do live, but still want to flex our minds with studio action.
UN: When recording how precise would you say you guys are? Do you care more about creating a vibe over having everything perfect? After all, the bands sound is quite noisy and harsh at times.
Matt: Yes, I would say we aren't too precise, as much as we felt we needed to be, I guess. When something is right, we know it, so we just go with that. When something is heard, and you can look around you, and look at the people surrounding you in the room you are sitting in, and everyone is kind of glazed out, and then everyone; AHHH YEAH, YEAH! That's the ticket. Good. That's when it's ready. Our song writing process is like that too, I think. We may argue, and all have different ideas, but when something is ready, we all know it.
UN: Would you say that San Francisco has an interesting music scene? Are there like minded bands in the cities scene? Are there a lot of venues that support unique music?
Matt: Yes, it certainly does. There are a ton of amazing bands in this burg! Some known, some not. Probably the best, most mind fuck band of our time lives in San Fransissy...a band by the name New Thrill Parade. Check on them for sure. They are a band that creates an all out fog of a mood. A bummer, but also a joy. Seeing that band, even for 40 nights in a row, like when we toured with them over the summer, brings me to a mental breakdown, sometimes making me think about things I might not want to think about even. Sometimes I want to cry when it happens, but mostly I just want to head bang. They fucking flip wigs man, they sound like no one else. Gothic Majesty! There's also killer electronic shit going down around here too. There's this group Hours Of Worship that make some blacked, noisy ass techno. Have not seem them live yet, but they are KILLER. This band Late Young also completely kill shit. Definitely dark, and noisy, and heavy, but not in the obvious ways, just fucked, really. Discordant, Swans meets Public Image ltd. type of shit going down. So yeah, there's amazing shit floating around, and it seems to me that things are not so bogged down in genre here...like we can play a more "punk" type of show with really killer, kind of poppy bands, like Tulsa, or The Ovens, and things are tight. No hate. A good venue for that in town is Thrill House Records. It's a really great record shop that throws shows in the basement. Like 4 nights a week...some of the best shows we've played, and pretty much the only good all ages spot. San Fran has really good Mexican food too...and killer record shops! A fine burg, indeed.
UN: I was curious to ask if there was a concept behind the album name. At first I thought it might have been the number of songs on the album, but there are seven songs so my theory was wrong.
Matt: There is a loose concept with that name...mostly having to do with the year 2006, when most of that stuff was written. It was a year of tumultuous, roaring fucking change. Some drastic shit happened that isnt worth mentioning for fear of over melo-dramatization...Things burned down, we moved, people were weird. Just some shit. There was also some other numerical significance that was tossed around, I can't really remember. There are kind of six "songs" on the record, which is happenstance. I really wanted it to only be five, but I'm glad my mind was changed.
UN: Was it important to put a lot of effort into the layout of the disc and the booklet? It seems more common these days for bands and labels to put in extra effort to give the listener the incentive to buy the album instead of just downloading it.
Matt: I would say that was pretty damn important to us. Maybe it's important to create a sort of artifact...and people are doing some amazing things these days. Better than ever. I don't think I would even place what we did in the echelon of some of the packaging that I see going down these days. We kept it pretty simple I think, but I think the images we presented perfectly represent our collective mind state at that time and place. Everyone in those photos, in which I was in none, was flying pretty high, so to speak. A mindfuck freedom. That's it. The reproduction is amazing, and Adam at crucial blast is to thank for that. I hope people get in to that artifact idea and want to hold the record, in all its tangibility. But, it's cool if people download it too, although I don't think Crucial Blast would be too stoked on that idea. And they shouldn't be. The music industry is weird right now, I think everyone knows that and are trying to figure it out. We just want people to dig the sounds so whatever. I understand downloading, although I'm too daft to figure it out myself plus I like holding things and looking at things and listening to things. The room is spinning right now. I think I'm a dying breed. I don't think my brother, whose five years old, will be buying records in his formative, interested years. Maybe he will though. I don't, and nobody fucking knows what's happening.
UN: Did it piss you guys off that you had to chance band name from Wildlife to Wildildlife? Did you toy around with the idea of completely changing the band name at all?
Matt: I don't think it pissed us off that much. One more ild is fine with us I mean, what the fuck ever, right? It's a name, and I think it works with us just fine. We had some other name ideas, but they all sucked. I wish we thought of Vampire Weekend that's a killer name. What a waste.
UN: What is it that you hope someone takes away from the album? Are there certain moods or a physical state you hope to create with the music?
Matt: Basically, when we wrote and recorded, we were acting on our various psychic states. People live day to day, I feel, kind of locked away from themselves, myself included. I mean, who the fuck wants to work? You spend 40 hours a week working on something that doesn't interest you in any way, you buy things, you talk to people about unimportant shit, you participate in a system that is completely opposed to the way your mind is structured, and then you play music, or crochet, or dance, or paint, or play table tennis, and that kind of thing melts away for a brief period. For me that's what music is, and that's all I can hope for. So I think that is the mood or state that we are working in. We want to sustain that state for as long as we can. We don't want to work and we don't want to vote. If someone caught the slightest glimpse of that when auditioning our music, that would make us very happy.
UN: Being in a band I'm sure you get asked stupid questions from people who have never heard the band. If someone asks what the band sounds like what do you say? That certainly wouldnt be an easy question especially if the person asking has no idea that experimental music even exists.
Matt: Well, that question isn't stupid, but I feel stupid when I don't have a good answer, which I don't. Uhhhhhh...I don't know man, It's loud. That's usually what I say. I think our influences are as diverse as they are obvious, so it's there, and it's open to interpretations. As far as experimental, I think we are, but only in the way all people are. Everything is an experiment. In relating to different personalities, in figuring out what sounds right, what feels right, what seems RIGHT. But it is not experimentation for its own sake. We like to make rock and roll music, essentially, and that's where our process starts and ends. But there's so much room in there for what might be known as experimentation.
UN: How would you say the Wildildlife sound translates to a live environment? Do you guys still closely to how the songs sound recorded or is there a lot of improvising in the live department?
Matt: Our live show and our recorded music is very different. Of course! The album exists and the show is happening. The album is historical, and the show is happening right now. So yeah, there's improvisation mostly born of fuck ups. When we play music live, with all of us together, in close proximity, I think what we are most concerned with is erasing our minds. Fugue state type of thing going down. We also want to have fun, and let ourselves be exposed in all that we are. We will get fucked up and play rock show for you. We will stare at you and drool until you let it go, or you can leave. It's kind of like that. I hope that in the future, I mean I think Andy and will are already there, but I hope that my per-formative nature and my musical nature can be married so I don't have to think, but the intent is still sound. I think sonically it still works out though. It's just noisier than the recording. We play together a lot, and have known each other even longer, so no matter what we are tight, but the sounds are often free...just stop and start at the same time.
Official Wildildlife Myspace
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