Chooglin' takes its Sweet Time
Jon Behm
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With a bigger horn section than Rocket From The Crypt and a name lifted from John Fogerty's term for "partying," and two former members of Minneapolis rock-revivalists the Midnight Evils, Chooglin' promises a good time—and delivered one on its self-titled 2006 debut. But the octet's new album, Sweet Time, on Fat Possum Records' sister label, Big Legal Mess, shoots for something more, expanding the previous record's riff-crazed hillbilly soul into a jazz-punk boogie that can become startlingly quiet, like a hotrod pulling over to take in some country air. In anticipation of Chooglin's Saturday, July 11, CD-release show at 7th St. Entry, singer-guitarist Brian Vanderwerf and lead guitarist/co-vocalist Jesse Tomlinson sat down with The A.V. Club.
A.V. Club: How did you guys hook up with Fat Possum, of R.L. Burnside and Heartless Bastards fame?
Brian Vanderwerf: Bruce Watson of Fat Possum was in town for the Deep Blues Festival, and he saw us in the Entry and asked, "Who's doing your next record?" I said, "I don't know, me?"
AVC: Why did you decide to form this band after the Midnight Evils broke up?
Jesse Tomlinson: I was in the Evils for almost 10 years, and I was like, "I can't stop playing all the time. Let's keep going."
BV: At that time, the Evils were going to go [on tour for] three weeks in Europe. We did a John Peel session, and we got asked us to do another one—he asked us on the air, which was pretty awesome. But then he passed away. Long story, but the momentum of the band just went [makes raspberry sound].
JT: We bought a van, and it started on fire in Bakersfield, Calif. We had sunk a lot of money into that van, and we had to ditch it. Two months before, the transmission went out in Philadelphia. Then we had to rent two cars to bring all our gear back to Minneapolis, and it all went on our guitarist's credit card.
BV: This last Chooglin' tour, we got back, and the van got stolen. We haven't recovered it yet.
AVC: So you have no transportation at the moment?
BV: That's why they're flying us to the [Down On The Farm] festival in Norway. One of the nice things is that Fat Possum's going to [help with] tour support, which involves renting a van.
AVC: So your response to road troubles with the Midnight Evils was to form an even larger band to take on the road?
JT: It's all about finding the right people. We're all pretty even-keeled. It started when Brian put together a Stones cover band at the end of the Evils, and I was playing lap steel.
BV: It was for First Avenue's cover-band contest, which we actually won. And they were like, "If you play [Exile On Main Street] from start to finish, we'll give you Saturday night." That's why we got all the other horn players. We did some other shows around town, as Eleganza!, and that's how we got to know those guys. Jeff [Johnson, bassist] was from the cover band. He left for California after this album, so we have Paul Wells, also from the cover band. For a drummer, we asked Shawn Walker, from Heads & Bodies, Gay Witch Abortion, and the Fuck Yeahs, who are still together without Paddy [Costello]; they're called Hamburger Help Me. It was like a first date: "We going to do this again?"
AVC: Did you know what you wanted Chooglin' to be from the outset?
JT: I didn't want to play drums anymore. I hadn't played guitar in a band for 10 years. I wrote a lot of the songs in the Evils too, so it was a natural progression. The initial [Chooglin'] songs were real rocking, and half of the songs on the first album we just came up with on the spot. After that, I kind of realized that since we have all these parts, we all didn't need to be playing the same riff. We used to bring [the horns] out halfway through the set, and finally it was just like, "It's stupid to have you guys come out halfway through." We started bringing them out full time. They drive the melody now, a lot of the time.
BV: They're into it. They're not hired guns. They're part of the band.
JT: We came to the realization that we can do anything we want. If we want to bring it way down, like do a weird waltz, screw it. Are people going to tell us no?
Chooglin' live at SXSW in 2008:
