It’s hard to listen to w h o k i l l, Merrill Garbus’s second album under the tUnE-YarDs monicker, and not hear in it a culmination of a long, rapid journey (she literally moved from Montreal to Oakland), and a realization of every ounce of potential displayed and, for too many people, hidden in the DIY haze of her debut, BiRd-BrAiNs, a wild, indefatigably interesting and occasionally less than entertaining promise of more to come. My friend and LA-based actor, Chris Mollica, joined me to discuss the album.
BRANDON: After touring tirelessly, getting signed to 4AD, selling a lucrative track to Blackberry (Way to go Blackberry. The relevance of your phone is inversely proportional to the hipness of your music!), moving from Montreal to Oakland, adding bassist and partner Nate Brenner and two saxophonists to the band (of one), Garbus set to work in a legitimate studio and did away with the divisive lo-fi aesthetic that played a larger than justifiable role in defining her debut.
One of the absolute stand-out tracks on BiRd-BrAiNs was a song called “Sunlight.” I listened to “Sunlight” on repeat for the entire summer of 2009 and wished the whole album could be as spectacular, as addictive, as that song. Then I saw her play at the Natural History Museum in Los Angeles opening for Atlas Sound where she put on an amazing show, beating the hell out of her drums, doing vocal acrobatics with her touring band mates, and I thought, “Good God! Why couldn’t BiRd-BrAiNs be this awesome!?”
And now, with w h o k i l l, every song is as spectacular as “Sunlight” and the album does feel as elated and exciting as her live show. It’s always disappointing when an artist or band achieves a modicum of success and squanders their newfound resources on baroque excess, or, worse, laziness. w h o k i l l loses none of the experimentation or left-field excitement of her debut album, but extrapolates and expands upon it, adding layer upon layer of intricate, bewildering, euphoric, and often beautiful textures that play within and without one another in a dizzying kaleidoscope. And the songs are fucking catchy. A rarity on her debut.
Chris, I feel like this might go long because I actually have a ton to say about tUnE-YarDs’ sophomore effort. Before I hand it over to you, let me just say, I’m pretty sure Garbus is a bonafide superhero. Which, considering the themes of violence that permeate the record, seems only right. How’s this album hitting you? And which songs, if any, have met “repeat” status?
CHRIS: Now, unlike you, I never heard BiRd-BrAiNs or caught word one of Merrill Garbus. There were no hopes of promise or unfulfilled potential. There was just lightning and it blew my socks off. w h o k i l l hit me like a gut reaction. The first line of the album sets it up. “My country tis of thee/ sweet land of liberty/ how come I cannot see/ my future within your arms?” In one line, ONE LINE, she acknowledges her homeland with words that are incredibly familiar to us (and strike a deep cord, especially given the days’ circumstances) [ed note: this response was written the evening Osama Bin Laden had been killed], and then laments at just how unwelcome she feels within this homeland. Wow. The emotional roller coaster that line takes me on… My sense is that the album is a response to that mission statement of a sentence. What does this individual do when left out on her own? Who is she? What is this world she’s in where even her home makes her feel disregarded?
BRANDON: Right on! I think the questions you feel that opening track pose are incredibly relevant. Peep this interview with Garbus – those are the same questions she seems to be dealing with on a daily basis, trying desperately to come to terms with who she is vs. who she wants to be, and beyond that, who this country really is vs. who it wants to be. The entire album keeps asking these questions, keeps piling them on. But it never gives any answers, only contradictions and different points of view.
CHRIS: Well, first of all, she plays whatever goddamn music she likes however she wants to play it. Brandon, w h o k i l l sounds unlike few things I’ve heard before. I know you have a few comparisons up your sleeve, your Dewey Decimal system of music, and I want to listen to them. tUnE-YarDs is smart about music. She sets up beats and drops them out when you least expect it. The album is melodic and, wait, no it’s not, but it works. She deconstructs music with skill akin to Radiohead or Panda Bear. Best of all, I want to play this album loud! It’s fun. It bounces along. At the same time, I couldn’t have been happier the two times I slapped on my favorite headphones and really listened to the lyrics. Each song is a new part of the struggle. “Gansta” with it’s bust on everyone trying to fit into a form, “Bizness” where the system is loved and despised all at once, to closer “Killa” which declares with no irony, “I’m a new kind of woman.”
BRANDON: I actually don’t see “Gangsta” as a condemnation of people who can’t fit in, but as she says in the song’s opening line, “What’s a boy to do?” If you can’t fit in, no matter how hard you try, then what? She says in the interview that she used to be a starving artist and now she has to come to terms with being a yuppie. And she always hated yuppies! In “Bizness” she cries, “What’s the business, yeah?/Don’t take my life away.” So she’s not starving and does domestic things and is a professional and, on this album, recorded everything in a studio. Does that mean she lost her street cred? What’s an artist to do? Also, to join your chorus, there’s only one way Gangsta should be listened to and that is LOUD!
CHRIS: Now, I’m intrigued on your take. Where do you feel the violence of the album lives?
BRANDON: “There is a freedom in violence that I don’t understand!” she screams after a particularly chaotic bridge of noises and tonal collisions in “Riotriot.” If the first song, “My Country,” was a mission statement then this album is a rollicking portrait of the United States from someone who’s not sure she’s all that ready to buy in. But really, is anyone? This is a violent country. Extremely violent. A congresswoman gets shot in the head in Arizona and the Arizona state legislature proceeds to try to pass a law making it legal to carry concealed guns on college campuses and they succeeded in naming an official state gun – the Colt Single-Action Army Revolver. This is baffling. But there seem to be a large and loud faction of people who seem more interested in amping the violence up than toning it down. Their answer to guns isn’t to limit them, but rather to make sure more people have them. What!?
I imagine Garbus would have been happy to stay in Montreal, but for issues with her Visa and a new bassist boyfriend, she moved to Oakland, a not altogether peaceful city. Yet, I want to be careful to note that the album does not come across ever as political. She never seems to take a stand one way or another, but rather observes and inquires. In “Doorstep,” which sounds like it could have been pulled right from the Dirty Projectors’ catalog, “policeman shot [her] baby as he crossed over the doorstep,” but in “Riotriot” she dreamt of making love to the policeman that came to put handcuffs on her brother. Talk about conflict.
Musically, too, the songs are rife with violence. Not just the sonic attack on “Riotriot” but the abrasive cutting and chopping of the songs like in “Gangsta” right before its euphoric coda or the tribal drums throughout the album that threaten to bring a hailstorm of war and death upon your village. And no mention of Garbus and the tUnE-YarDs should go without major attention being paid to the, I’ll say it again, superhero qualities of her voice that can soothe and destroy and drop jaws all in one song. Listen to where her voice goes on “Powa,” (one of my absolute favorites on the album) seducing, killing, and actually damn near aping Mariah Carey at the end! Then listen to her hold her own with the best jazz singers on “Es-So” and “You Yes You” right before she melts your face off in “Gangsta” or “Bizness” only to try to play nurse with a fist full of gauze on “Woolywollygong.”
CHRIS: Speaking about what songs I have on repeat, “Woolywollygong” has me spinning in the amount of layers and ideas tUnE-YarDs can cram into one song. The erie background strikes a beautiful tone of uncertainly on top of which Garbus coos a lullabye. It’s the most soothing her voice gets on an album in which you fall in love with her every hoot and holler. The lyrics are comforting, paranoid, and hopeful all at once. Given the rollicking journey through self introspection, world dissection, and violence, as you mentioned, that w h o k i l l takes us on, it actually feels pretty optimistic. In a way, I see w h o k i l l as a lovely companion to the other soul searching album out there right now, Fleet Foxes’ Helplessness Blues.
Brandon: Wait, what!? A companion to Fleet Foxes Helplessness Blues? Wow. I don’t think I ever expected someone to make that comparison. Maybe it’s apt.
Though, while I love “Woolywollygong,” optimistic is not the word that comes to mind when I think about it. I go more towards ominous. Creepy. Terrifying. I’m not a connoisseur of lullabies but if they all sounded like this, I don’t think I would have had a single night without a nightmare as a child.
CHRIS: In the end, I guess I’m the clear eyed optimist, and “Woolywollygong” just breaks my heart. At least Garbus is pulling for the things that keep a person open and present. She wants the best for that baby. Like you said, the world’s too uncertain for her to be definite about anything.
BRANDON: You know, since we started talking about this album, something very significant, at least psychologically, happened in this country, and I’ve been thinking a lot about the line on “My Country” where she says “The worst part of living a lie is just wondering when they’ll find out.” Given how complex we are, how full of contradictions and hypocrisies we, and by extension the world, are, it becomes increasingly difficult with every passing day to distill anything into a single honest truth. Nothing is black and white. Good people do bad things and vice versa. It’s so frustrating to hear people in the world try to paint others as this or that. Because as soon as you decide you’re one thing, you’ll quickly discover you’re something else. And then what do you do? Cover it up? Embrace the hypocrisy? What about the backlash? I know Garbus has spent a lot of time thinking about this, coming to terms with it. I’m sure the decision just to record in a studio was a conflicting one for her.
The other night, President Obama announced that the United States military had killed Osama Bin Laden. The response then and the day after seemed celebratory. It feels weird and wrong to celebrate the death of anybody. It seems like a proliferation of a black and white, good vs. evil mentality. If he felt that killing people was the means to his end, then aren’t we just playing the same game? Death begetting death? Is this the freedom in violence Garbus was talking about? Well, then, I’m with her. I don’t understand.
CHRIS: I was hit by that line in “My Country” as well and love your take on it. I guess in the end, it’s that struggle with self that I ultimately identified with most and which led to the Fleet Foxes comparison. Both albums are distinct sounds driven by and filled with big questions. There may not be any easy answers, but honestly who wants that? Struggle begets strength, growth, depth and great music. If life’s a journey and I have music like tUnE-YarDs’ latest to blast along the way, I’m going enjoy the hell out of this ride.
How’s that for a snazzy closer?
BRANDON: Perfect.
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