Music history has innumerable examples of "next big thing" artists who never lived up to the expectations. Hype burns brightly but extinguishes quickly, and that can crush those who bought into it. The buzz around Neko Case has long called her a star in waiting, a songwriter with an inimitable voice who moves closer to the big time with each new record. As Case prepared her fifth album, Fox Confessor Brings The Flood, rumors circulated that it was her best yet—and they were right. A shoe-in for year-end best-of lists, Confessor expands Case's airy, country-leaning Americana into new spaces far beyond the alt-country template. During its opening week, Confessor sold 18,000 copies to debut at #54 on the Billboard Top 200, an unprecedented accomplishment for Case. Her new success has a lot to do with her move from a small indie (Bloodshot) to a big indie (Anti-), whose considerable resources have helped sustain the buzz.
But Case isn't buying any of it. She's the first to say she's too old and too clothed to land any arena tours—and she prefers it that way. Her punk-rock background gave her a DIY ethos, plus a desire to avoid the eviscerating limelight. Whether Confessor will boost her to new heights remains to be seen, but she's content where she is. Before she began her spring tour, she spoke to The A.V. Club about fame, turning 35, and the Green River Killer.
The A.V. Club: It seems this record is getting a really big publicity push.
Neko Case: Anti- is a much bigger label than any I've ever been on, and they're all really behind the record, and they've been great. I'm very surprised by their enthusiasm, which sounds like an insult, but really it's kind of heartwarming.
AVC: Does it feel weird?
NC: On one hand, I've been with [Canadian indie label] Mint for, like, 12 years, and it's two guys, and I've never had a problem with them—we've always gotten along really good. But it's another thing when there's 40 employees, how much quicker things can get done—which is not a slight on Mint, because they work way too hard over there—but it's like a machine, man. It's amazing. I'm enjoying it for sure.
AVC: You said this album has the only autobiographical song you've ever written, "Hold On, Hold On." What do you mean by "autobiographical"?
NC: I mean that the song is actually about me. It's not metaphorical about other people. It's not little pieces of my life made into a story about someone else or someone fictitious.
AVC: Why do you think you've avoided that?
NC: I don't necessarily think that I'm the most interesting person in the world. [Laughs.] I'm more interested in stories about other people or stories in general. I was raised to be overly modest. In my family, they don't talk about themselves, and so talking about yourself almost seems sinful or vain, which is totally silly. I think I just have a natural aversion to it. I use my own experience, 'cause obviously I don't have anybody else's experiences to use firsthand. I put that in there, experiences of people I know, I make things up. I was really inspired by fairy tales on this record, so I wanted to make stories that were more like fairy tales than modern-day stories. Things that were a little more fantastical, with characters like animals who talk and whatnot, 'cause I was always really attracted to those kinds of things in stories.
AVC: You've written personal stuff before, though, like the Tacoma tribute "Thrice All American" on Furnace Room Lullaby.
NC: "Thrice All American" is more about a town, and there are other people's experiences in there too, 'cause I grew up with a lot of other people. We were all very poor, and we really loved our town, so it was this weird camaraderie we all had. That camaraderie wasn't just generated by myself; it was me and a lot of other people that I knew. It was for them and about them as well. Whereas this song is just me. It's not so dark as some people think; it's a little more smartass. It's not really knowing where you fit in—35 years old, I'm supposed to be married with kids by now, and I'm not really feeling that. I feel about 19 pretty much all the time.
AVC: That's good?
NC: Yeah, it's good. Sometimes, you have to wonder—pretty much everyone does it—when you just have your little reality check where you're like, "Wait a minute, there's nothing wrong with what I'm doing."
AVC: Was your 35th a big, taking-stock kind of birthday?
NC: No, I don't really notice them that much. I'm not really that concerned—that's why I'm not afraid to tell people how old I am, I guess. [Laughs.] I've been having that realization for quite a few years. There's just societal pressures, things you grow up with. You wonder, in your sad moments, "Is there something wrong with me? I don't have a mate. Will I ever have a child?" And then you realize, "Wait a minute, I'm responsible. I don't need to be wondering that about myself." I'm sure I could have had plenty of children by now. None of them would have had the attention that they should, and that would have been wrong.
AVC: The personal theme also extends to "Dirty Knife," which is about people you know who went crazy, right?
NC: It's a story my grandmother told me about a bunch of people in our family who all went crazy at the same time. People didn't realize it 'til they went and found them in their house. They had just stopped leaving the house, and they were burning the furniture for heat. They were pretty nuts. I made the story on the record about one person, because I couldn't quite figure out how to make the story work about several.
AVC: "Dirty Knife" and "Deep Red Bells" on Blacklisted are both pretty dark, but country music has a long tradition of murder ballads. Do you think the songs are more related to that, or to the macabre elements of your own life?
NC: I know that they're definitely related to that [tradition], because I listen to that kind of music and have as long as I can remember. But then, I have a pretty macabre sense of humor—I think most people do. I think it's a part of life. Eastern European fairy tales are very much about that. We happen to live in the modern West, where Disney has just ruined everything. Those things exist and they are palatable in a lot of ways, but they try to strip everything of any kind of danger, which I find incredibly boring. It's almost disrespectful to the intelligence of people, I think, especially kids.
AVC: "Deep Red Bells" was about the Green River Killer, whose murders you've said really affected your childhood in Tacoma. What did you think when he was caught a couple of years back?
NC: You know what's really fucked up about that? He got caught right after we recorded that song, and he got caught after like 10 years of hearing nothing on the news. Not that I had anything to do with him being caught, but it really was a huge emotional blow. I remember I cried really hard when he got caught. It was opening up a chapter in my life. I grew up while he was killing women, and on the news, they never talked about them like they were women. They just called them "prostitutes." Myself and other little girls in my neighborhood didn't make that distinction; we thought the Green River Killer was going to kill us. We were scared of him. We'd go to school with steak knives in our pockets and stuff.
AVC: Do you still think about it now?
NC: I think about it every time I walk somewhere by myself, which is a lot.
AVC: Your Chicago neighborhood, Humboldt Park, is notorious for crime, but not that kind of crime.
NC: Yeah, it's a different kind of thing. I've lived around crime my whole life. I don't really feel threatened by it; it makes me intensely sad. I can feel it all the time. People have been shot to death right out in front of my house. You can hear their sister in the street screaming for two hours, and the ambulance never leaves, and they die right there. You hear every word. These houses are old—you can hear everything that happens in the street.
AVC: Is that the inspiration for "Star Witness"?
NC: Yeah, that song's about Humboldt Park.
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