Leia and I met up with Sam and - a bit later - Jon, at Cafe Giulia in Chippendale and had what turned out to be a very interesting discussion about what was coming for the human race/the music industry which then evolved into a very interesting discussion about parasites and robots, for some reason. But because I'm lazier than Jack Lang and Frederic Mitterand combined (there, I said it), the entire thing didn't get transcribed. So this is just the stuff about the future. Your welcome.
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Can't Sleep: What do you think the future's looking like at the moment? Are you optimistic about it?
Sam: Yea, every time I get asked this sort of thing I don't feel like I'm really qualified to know what I'm talking about but I know that in the last few weeks, going to (GoodGod Small Club), I saw Royal Headache the other night, which was incredible, I saw Ghosts of Television doing their album launch... So them, and people like Knitted Abyss, I've seen a lot of things in the recent past that've been really encouraging, people who are just really switched on with really open ears. People like Ghosts of Television, I guess they have that, without kind of 'pigeon holing' it, that post-punk kind of thing going on, which is great but I know just from hanging out with those guys, I think they all went to see Fleetwood Mac the other day and they're all really into hip hop and other stuff. I think a lot of people are kind of blurring the lines in terms of taste, like what you should or shouldn't be into, you know...
A lot of people are avoiding the typical sort of 'pub circuit', there's a lot of warehouse things, gallery things. It's pretty hands on, it doesn't seem to be a snooty kind of thing. You know, kids with long necks, and they're all really young, which is pretty cool.
CS: So when the Holy Soul is making music do you look to the future for inspiration, or do you tend to look backwards?
S: We don't really discuss it or think about it a whole lot. I guess when we first started people were like, “Oh, you're one of those ‘Nuggets’ kind of bands”, and I think we kind of bristled at that. Then later on, people were like, “Oh, you're one of those Beasts of Bourbon/Scientists kind of bands”, and when we did our most recent record I think we were keen to do something that didn’t have a reductive angle on it. In terms of looking to the past, I suppose it's inevitable to draw on music you like but there's nothing really specific I could point to other than saying that we try to play to our strengths and avoid our weaknesses. I guess we just try to be free to fuck around with whatever ideas come up.
CS: What do you think the future of music will be? With all the new technology we have, do you think it'll get better?
S: There seems to be this perception of a strict, linear development of rock music, you know, “This happened in the 60s, this happened in the 70s, 80s, 90s” and now it just seems so scattered and it's really hard to say what the fuck's going on. Which I kind of like. I guess everybody says people aren't going to buy records any more, and I'm not really up on that buying music from iTunes and all of that, which is great, but... it's not really something that applies to a band like us. Maybe to some degree we just have an older audience, who are a little set in their ways. As ever, big music fans are right in to vinyl. I guess vinyl's interactive as well, you know instead of having an iPod, with vinyl you have to get up at least every 23 minutes and flip it over. I like what Ghosts of Television have done with that record, they put out about 150 or 130 copies on vinyl but you can download it for free if you want. And it's a really sexy looking record.
CS: Do you think we'll ever have our science fiction future with the flying cars and robot armies, all of the stuff that's in the movies?
S: It sounds good, doesn't it? A few years ago we played in Europe with Mudhoney, and every night they played this song called 'Where's the Future?',and it's all about, where is this proper future with the flying cars and stuff like that? “Where is this future that was promised us? I'm sick to death of this one. I wanna visit my family on mars, I wanna ride with my personal jet pack”. It’s a stab at the kind of future that Bush era U.S.A. was dishing up at the time. There was this shop next to my house that popped up a while ago, it had astronaut food in it. I think it was mostly for campers, and you get powdered ice cream. It tasted horrible, we're not quite there with the sci fi food.
CS: So again with the technology thing, do you think it's helping creativity or hindering it?
S: I don’t know but I've got nothing against auto tune or synths or whatever, we've never personally used em... we did once, just as joke in the studio, put auto tune on a vocal just for our own amusement. Didn't really sound good. Generally, we've recorded on analog equipment, we've done things on cassette and reel-to-reel but we're not ideologically like, “This is what you've gotta do.” We don't feel like we're part of any analog movement or anything. I think getting things done by any means necessary is fine, we mix digitally, we're not really hung up on being a “purist”, sometimes there's a sort of naff mystique over bands who say “Oh, we only ever record to cassette”. A lot of that stuff is cool but we don't really buy into (it) as a movement.
CS: One thing that really concerns me is, and I guess it's symptomatic of iTunes and iPods and all of that, bands and a lot of the big hip hop producers don't make proper albums any more, it's all about singles. So do you think in the future, it'll be the death of the album? There won't be the big album bands around?
S: There has been a lot of talk around that lately, I don't really see it coming into effect very much. A lot of records that've come out in the last couple of years, they always say it's going to be the last “ALBUM” to come out. We grew up with the format, have an affection for it, we like the kind of 39 minute album, we're fine with that. So for us, it's hard to imagine us not really working outside of that, I mean it's totally artificial format but so is pop music. Maybe some hip hop could benefit from a more “single song” environment, even if there are some really great long playing hip hop records. But there's that Snoop Dogg record that come out a little while ago, and it's got that amazing single on it, 'Drop It Like It's Hot', it's incredible, but the record is absolute pants, it's a piece of shit. Like in the 60s, you'd have the Beatles and the Stones answering each other with singles, I really like how hip hop seems to have that thing going on. There’s a one upmanship going on, and that’s not so common in rock singles.
CS: So do you think humans have an ability to predict the future? In any way, shape or form? Do you think Orwell and Huxley are on the right track?
(They) seem to be, don't they? There's a lot of eerie parallels with what those guys were saying and I noticed the other day, Speaking of Huxley, you can learn Esperanto in Petersham. I saw this little sign, “Inquire within, Esperanto lessons.”
CS: Do you think, any time in the future, we'll be able to eliminate some of the problems we're having now, or is it just human nature to be self destructive?
S: I don't know...I was in the States right before the election and people were pretty psyched about it. You know that guys who did the Boondocks, if you've ever seen that show, the cartoon strip, Aaron McGruder? He described himself as “cautiously pessimistic” about the whole Obama thing. I guess I feel the same way, but what the fuck would I know?
(Jon arrives)
CS: In terms of social interaction, do you think we'll just end up being more and more aligned on social networking sites like Facebook?
Jon: I reckon we already are.
CS: Do you think it'll get any worse?
J: Once everyone has an iPhone, they let it run everywhere they're going.
S: What do you think about the death of the album, Jon? They were asking about that before.
J: Yea, I don't think it will die... I'm curious to know what the next new instrument will be. I don't think we've had a new instrument this decade
S: The Keytar is getting old now.
J: Maybe you could claim that Auto Tune is this decade's new instrument... I don't know, it's kind of disappointing. Like, we're doing this radio show and one of the things it said was to wrap up the last decade of new music. And we're just kind of looking at it going, “Eh...”, there's not really much good new stuff going around.
CS: Yea, that's what I'm wondering. If there's going to be any new formation of a genre, if anything's going to be fused together, or is it just going to be recycled and re appropriated with a few new influences, or if it's going to be something really dramatic. I can't think of anything.
J: I think, if you look back, there seems to be an instrument that creates the new music.
S: I guess hip hop is one of the only real new forms of music to come up in our lifetime.
J: There's been a lot of (new music) in our lifetime. But a lot of it's not popular music. Even within that electronic music, there's lots of new forms of music which is really unique, like acid house and jungle music. And I guess in this decade we have dub step, but I don't think that's really mind-blowingly unique.
