ME: People that try to make "important" music usually fail. Because the more you approach an angle you think is "important," the more that is lost in translation of those things, if that makes sense. We were talking about what heavy music was, and we mentioned artists as disparate as Black Sabbath and Charles Ives and Albert Ayler, and all these weirdoes—at least to begin with, they were all outsiders, and the thing they all had in common was that they were just reflecting some truth back to the listener. That's all heavy music can ever do, but once it hits a chord and you do it exactly right, it becomes awesome.
AB: It becomes undeniable. I think that's what [heavy music] really means to me, when it comes down to it, music that you can't deny. You might like it or you might not, but you can't deny it. That's the feeling I really got when I was listening to Xasthur, or black metal, stuff like that. There's very soft, gentle music that can still have that weight to it, where you can't ignore it and it has an effect on you one way or another, like the Beach Boys.
AVC: There are soft sections on Ditherer too; it isn't loud all the time.
AB: Right, but I felt like in our previous stuff, there was too much that was on the fence, and was maybe in some subconscious way me trying to make everyone happy. Everyone says that those [earlier Fog] records are all difficult, but for me, I was too concerned with trying to please both sides of the fence, and it comes across as kind of mushy. [Ditherer] comes back to doing something that wasn't as easy to gloss over as just something kind of quirky. It had to be more than that to keep working.
AVC: Ditherer feels like a happier record than what you've done previously.
AB: It's definitely not for me. There's more joy in the music—the subject matter definitely not, but I think that there's more of a release there, and I think that's going back to the band setup. Where you're working on your own, you're kind of layering one thing on top of the other, and it has this claustrophobic feel to it, which is my problem with most stuff I hear that's in the quote-unquote bedroom style. It can't but be an insular navel-gazing experience, no matter what you're writing about, if you're doing it yourself. Unless you're like Prince.
ME: Or Stevie Wonder. See, artists like that in the past had a social element. Bob Dylan did some of his greatest work all by himself, but there was a social element. He was performing in front of other people; he wasn't locked in a room alternating between his four-track and Pitchfork Media. He had an outside world that he could draw upon. He was reading newspapers, reading books. It seems that a lot of bedroom artists, if you want to call them that, don't have any other reference point beyond their own lives. And that's fine, you know, they have a life, and their life can be as interesting as any other life, but I'd rather hear from a great artist who's interacting with the world than artists who are only interacting with themselves.
AB: Right, or if you are going to be a bedroom artist that's all about your own life, I say go full-on with the nihilism, which takes us back to the black metal once again.
AVC: Especially with the trio playing a larger part in the recording of Ditherer, has your approach to playing live come closer to the way you approach playing in the recording studio?
AB: It has, and I'm thankful for that, because it used to be basically a disservice. People would hear the record and then see us live, and be like, "What the fuck?" Now these songs are playable enough on their own that they'll be recognizable as the song, but it's not like I want everything to be completely stripped-down. The studio is still a great tool, and we'll still put whatever on the record that makes the song more interesting. I'm still all about texture. I love all the ear-candy stuff, and I don't think I would ever let go of that. Plus there's a lot of baggage with people's perception of what you're doing when you're holding a certain instrument—people see a turntable onstage, and that's a big signifier for them that you have something to do with rap, whether you do or don't Or if you're just three guys, guitar, bass, and drums, it'll be really easy to come across as power-trio Hüsker Dü punk, and that's not necessarily what we're going for either.
AVC: So how do you counter that?
AB: I think we counter that naturally, because we've had so much experience dabbling and having played shows with so many different lineups, trying this thing and that. We used to have a piano and turntables and horns, keyboards, upright bass, and God knows what. I think you hear that effort being channeled through similar instruments. I think my experience in being a musician that plays on the turntables comes through in my guitar playing. I don't know how, but I think it does.
ME: On an almost bullshit level, too, we almost have a sense that we're trying to redeem the classic rock lineup. We don't talk about it much, but we feel like that.
AB: I think it's because we're self-conscious about it, which is weird, because I'm sure it's totally normal for anyone else. Anyone else who wanted to be in a band would be, "Okay, we need guitar, bass, and drums." Whereas us, we're, "Ooh, guitar, bass, and drums… How can we make this weird?" There's a self-consciousness there that's going to prevent us from settling into the typical rock-band mode—which is good for us. If that happened, we'd all lose interest in what we were doing pretty quickly.
ME: Pretty much everybody's who's played in Fog has divergent musical interests—Martin Dosh, Jeremy Ylvisaker, Mike Lewis in Happy Apple and Fat Kid Wednesdays. I find it inspiring that people do things other than what is considered their main commercial project. That's not always easy for people, and it's not always wise for them to do it, because it takes time away from their bread and butter. But I think as musicians, it only makes you better. I wish all musicians had to do that. If I was King Of The Music Land, I would say all musicians have to be in more than one thing, because that will make you a better musician, and we all benefit from that.
AB: Playing improvised music [in the side project HeatdeatH] totally informs things that I do with Fog, and very much serves as a springboard for ideas and motivation. You can bounce those two worlds off of each other.
ME: And, you know, if you listen to the record, that's one thing, but the impression you get from being there live and listening to [a band] is a physical one. It's something that I think all people who make stuff should aspire to, to affect people in a physical, physiological way. And a band that can do that not just by rattling the seats with bass, but just kind of insinuating itself into your body, you know, that kind of thing is pretty rare. And I think it's what Fog tries to do.
AB: When I have a musical experience like that, that's one of the best feelings I can have as a human, when I'm touched by music like that so forcefully and all-encompassingly. So, to have a couple different avenues where you can strive for that is definitely the goal. That, and have a song on The O.C.
ME: [Laughs.] I don't think The O.C. is a television show any more.
AB: That's our main goal. To be on a show that doesn't exist any more.
ME: [Laughs.]
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