Optical Atlas Interview with Davey Wrathgabar (The Visitations)

Here is my interview with Davey Wrathgabar of Athens, GA bands The Visitations and Fablefactory. This was first posted on June 13, 2006, and was part of my “Liner Notes” series of interviews. (Keep the date in mind when noting the political references.)

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For years Davey Wrathgabar was the cold dark heart of Fablefactory; while Johnson Clark, aka Hank Wren, wrote straightforward rockers and Roxanne Martin, aka Freckles LeChat, meditated on the miracles of childbirth (“Pop Out!”), Davey’s songs told stories of twisted individuals acting upon deranged impulses, or alien abductions, or peyote hallucinations, or rednecks and backwoods preachermen. His songs, with their vivid, visceral lyrics, chart a map of the bizarre underbelly of America, but always with a wise, sardonic point of view. When Fablefactory split in 2001, Davey began releasing his solo recordings as The Visitations, first with an instrumental of the same name on the Japanese compilation U.S. Pop Life Vol. 10: Athens Experimental, then with his debut on Happy Happy Birthday to Me Records. The eponymous record seems to announce itself as a concept album about UFOs and other paranormal matters, but quickly departs the theme for stories of depraved sex, a decomposing misanthropist, and a pugilist who never lived up to his abusive father’s expectations. It’s a richly arranged collage of high concepts, haunting melodies, and thumping drumbeats. The second album, Propaganda, was a sharp turn in direction, and this time stuck to its concept: politics. Specifically, George W. Bush, but also Rush Limbaugh (who is cooked quite thoroughly on “Talkin’ Hate Radio Blues”), voting in Florida, Christianity, and other light topics. Self-released in the last presidential election year, its point-of-view has aged well, given how that election turned out. Davey took time out from working on a third Visitations album to reflect on six songs of Optical Atlas’s choosing (three from each of his bands), and to provide a pair of previously unreleased demos to throw some light on the recording process.

1) To start in Fablefactory country: “Broken Arms.” Hank Wren wrote, “Perhaps the most spine tingling and macabre song Dave has written to date.” I really love this song. If you weren’t listening to the lyrics–I suppose this goes for a lot of songs of yours–you could just get lost in the melody and miss how savage the metaphors are.

It’s a song about a relationship I had in college. We were both young and in love with each other, but had both grown up with unhappy, bickering parents. Nobody wants to act like their parents, and nobody ever realizes that they do. We had this cycle of dysfunction in common, she and I. We were really hurtful to each other. At least we can laugh about it now.

The recording process for that song mirrors the dysfunction that inspired it. Hank and I both laid down guitar on Roxanne’s drums, and our pal Dickie put a bassline on it; unfortunately we didn’t know what we were doing and it sounded lame and tinny. We thought the problem was the guitar arrangement, so we got Andrew [Rieger] and Aaron [Wegelin] from Elf Power to add two more tracks each: total overkill. And the recording still sucked. So we made a mix and deleted it from the hard drive (that’s the way we rolled back in ’97).

I decided the song must suck, because I had read a lot of books about recording and thought I knew what I was doing. Later, Chris Bishop added another track of drums, another bassline, and a piano. We threw a few more vocals just so they would be up in the mix. The song ended up as part of an outtakes lottery we used to decide which comp got which track; Happy Happy Birthday To Me got “Broken Arms.” I think it sounds pretty good, if a bit messy. At least I can laugh about it now.

Broken Arms – Fablefactory

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2) “Total Psychotic Breakdown.” My favorite song of Freak Out Hard On You; any comments or memories?

I wrote that one on New Year’s Day 1999. Roxanne and I almost broke up the night before. I don’t remember what set us off, but I think it was like our second argument in five years (not a sign of a healthy relationship). I guess we were unsatisfied or some such shit. We probably should have walked away that day. Case in point: I turned the episode into a big joke of a song. Are we singing “I need dope, I mean,” or “I need dopamine?” What I really needed was to write an honest tune or keep my goddamn mouth shut. What’s good for rock is often not good for girlfriend. This might be doubly true if girlfriend rocks. Every time we’d play it live, I could just feel Roxanne seething behind me on the drums. Luckily, although we didn’t realize it at the time, we were working on a whole album about dysfunction. My only regret is that I didn’t freak out a little harder.

Total Psychotic Breakdown – Fablefactory

3) “Navajo Peyote Song.” The definitive peyote song. A singalong.

I had a Native American pal in high school who was into all sorts of psychedelics. He was from Minnesota, and definately not Navajo. He was really just another suburban kid, but we recruited him as our shaman. He’s the inspiration for the character Enis, who actually appeared in a few other tunes that shall never see the light of day. We were also into conspiracy theorist and sci-fi author Robert Anton Wilson back then. The Mescalito reference in the song is from his nonfiction Cosmic Trigger Vol I. The singalong part is from a field recording of a “real” Navajo peyote song. You can hear it trail off at the end of the song. I had lost the unlabeled cassette my friend had made me by the time Fablefactory was recording. There was a boombox demo of the song that had a piece of the cassette hastily pasted onto the end, so we sampled it.

The real song fits with the chord progression of my song, but I’ve always regretted the way the words ended up sounding like “Hey Oh Way-O-Yanna Wanna Way Hey-Yo.” The real thing sounds so differently. I tried like heck to find another copy of the recording, or another recording of a peyote song. I e-mailed all sorts of academics who blew me off. I really wanted to make the refrain accurate and to get a translation. I figure it means “I’m tripping my balls off.”

Navajo Peyote Song – Fablefactory (demo)
Navajo Peyote Song – Fablefactory (completed version)

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4) On to The Visitations: “It’s Superstition.” More hyperbole: this song launches a pounding drum and then some of the freakiest, most thrilling noises before you start to sing. An excellent good rock song, and it sets the mood for the paranormal theme of the album.

“It’s Superstition” is about how human desire, as represented by the concept of the wishing well, causes human suffering, which in turn causes human desire. I think I make a pretty strong case for the reality of the cause-and-effect relationship. The irony is that this cycle manifests in the form of superstitions. So the trolls who live at the bottom of the wishing well are in a sense real. Their bile is the source of our hopes and dreams. We do dumb, often destructive things in pursuit of happiness.

We miss what we have lost and seek to fill the voids in our lives. As Faulkner puts it, “[we] cling to that which has robbed [us].” The line “…it’s superstition…” comes in the background vocals that mock the voice telling the story.

The evil sounds come from the classic Casio CZ-101. It’s fully programable in a way Casio never tried again. My CZ-101 is long gone, but I’d do almost anything to get another one. Evil!

It’s Superstition – Visitations

5) “Blessed Flying Object”–just lovely, this one. I like how it starts as the notes from “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and develops into a Visitations song. But the most interesting aspect is the lyrics, which treat a close encounter with a UFO as a religious experience.

Hey, I never noticed the connection with Close Encounters before…creepy! Just kidding. “Blessed Flying Object” is also inspired by Robert Anton Wilson’s Cosmic Trigger. He writes of the UFO – BVM connection. The theory is that experiences with the Blessed Virgin Mary roughly mirror experiences with unidentified flying objects. Bright lights, levitation, wide hypnotic eyes…they seem to be markers of the same visitation viewed through different cultural lenses.

I was recording the guitar on the 4-track and ready to sing when I was visited by a kidney stone. You know how those Greys like to implant things into your sex organs. They say it’s as close as a man will ever come to giving birth. I was in labor for about a week and a half. You don’t sleep. You don’t eat. You pop pills and moan and sweat out urea.

But when it comes out of you, your whole body fills with an overwhelming sense of joy. So I sang. Later on, when I decided to use the tune on Visitations, I wanted to re-take the vocal because I originally sang into a karaoke machine microphone. But I’ll never get another take like that one, God willing.

Blessed Flying Object – Visitations

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6) “Television.” I think “the world’s deaf, dumb, and blind” is an apt summary, especially for late 2004, when this album came out and Bush was about to win another election. The chorus has an interesting idea–“The world outside looks just like the television”–meaning, maybe, the world lacks depth or self-reflection.

The song started as a reflection inspired by Craig Raine’s poem, “A Martian Sends A Postcard Home.” His line reads, “Rain is when the earth is television. It has the property of making colours darker.” He didn’t mean that the television portrays the world darkly, but I always thought the Martian’s observation was apt. The original tune was really different. The words were really different, too. The Dubya cut-up was added at the last minute, more as an intro to the album than as part of the song.

The song actually began to reveal itself to me during the first Visitations tour in 2001. We were supposed to play in NYC on September 14th, if I remember correctly. Of course the show was cancelled, and we avoided going into the city. From the NJ Turnpike, though, the world outside looked just like the television. There was still that big plume hanging over the city in place of the Towers.

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Folks were pulled over all along the right shoulder of the Northbound side. Some laid wreaths or put up signs, but I was struck by the number of people snapping photos for posterity. The photographic record seemed important to people, as if to say “I was there, I saw this destruction, from whatever distance, and can testify to its reality.” But the photographic record is bullshit, at least as manipulatable as language, just as open to interpretation as words. Everybody wanted a piece of the action. Folks in Richmond and Providence and Vermont all told us that they were supposed to be the fourth target, the intended destination of United 93. It was a great time to experience America if you love hate. Everybody wanted to be a victim to justify themselves. Nobody said “Shit, I guess that supporting despotism and genocide in the Middle East for the past 50 years must have really pissed some people off.” Ironically, the most realistic and thoughtful discussion of the events I experienced was in Arlington, VA (just a few miles from the Pentagon).

I also toured in May 2003, as the bombs started falling on Baghdad. I had already given up on the song by that point. It was too esoteric, not direct enough. But events gave them more meaning than ever. That’s how the song was transformed into a rocker. How is it that we live in a society with so much information yet so few informed people.

And I’m not just talking about folks who voted for Dubya. That week a friend told me that she hoped they didn’t find WMDs. What an awful thing to hope for, that so many people would die for nothing, or that the whole thing was just an evil conspiracy, or that American foreign policy would be irreparably damaged for decades to come. I guess it was my own perception lacked depth and self-reflection. I wonder if she visited a wishing well. Fucking trolls!

Television – Visitations (demo)
Television – Visitations (completed version)

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The Optical Atlas Show

 

Sometime around 2007 I decided I would attempt to bring my Optical Atlas site to the next level by initiating a podcast. However, this was a case of intent exceeding my means. For one thing, I did not live in close proximity to the Elephant 6 collective. For another, I cut my landline (before it was cool), which meant I had to get clever to capture the interviews. These days, I’d use Skype – but for whatever reason I thought a traditional phone call was the way to go. For my interviews with John Ferguson (Big Fresh) and Robert Schneider (The Apples in Stereo) I grabbed a meeting room at work and used the speaker phone, placing my recorder up next to it, and proceeded to make a long distance call. The Robert one was particularly dicey because it was long, and because the door wasn’t soundproof – and my boss was sitting not very far away (and perhaps wondering where I was). When the interview was over I sheepishly slipped out of the room and back to my desk.

There were only three episodes because of these limitations – it was too much of a hassle. (Again, why didn’t I just use Skype?) I think what I really wanted to do was edit them together; that’s where I took the most enjoyment. For example, in episode 1 you’ll hear a snippet of audio I recorded in an elevator, secretly taping some girls chatting while the elevator beeps off the floors. Then Robert’s theme song for the show kicks in. If I could have had someone else perform the interviews, to hand over the raw materials for me to play with later, I would have been more than happy.

And yes, Robert, a big supporter of the site, did compose the theme song, performing it alongside John Ferguson I believe – that’s 2/3 of my show’s total guests! He said it could be credited to The Apples in Stereo. It’s very much along the lines of his “Apples in Stereo Theme Song” that he made for his band’s website a few years earlier. Surely his Apples song “Tin Pan Alley” was expressing a sincere wish to be a songwriter for hire, accepting any challenge to make a catchy melody. Of course I was overjoyed when he volunteered to do the song. (Now I’m remembering – I had put out a request to a swath of musicians asking if anyone would like to compose a short theme song, and Robert answered the call. I think I also asked Bill Doss, Andy Gonzales…I can’t remember who else.)

For the second episode, Jimmy Hughes was kind enough to perform a little Folklore concert in my basement. Joining him are Derek Almstead and Ian Rickert. I think Derek was appalled by my complete lack of preparation for that one – I had a single cheap little microphone and that was it. My half-assed idea would be that we’d create a seat-of-our-pants bedroom recording. Folklore pulled it off.

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Episode 1: John Ferguson Interview (Big Fresh)

Episode 2: Folklore Live

Episode 3:  Robert Schneider Interview (The Apples in Stereo)

Optical Atlas Interviews with Laura Carter (Elf Power) and Zachary Gresham (Summer Hymns)

These are the last of my “6 Questions with…” interviews from Optical Atlas. Laura Carter of Elf Power mentions the band’s collaboration with Vic Chesnutt, Dark Developments, which would be released in 2008. Prior to Vic’s passing in 2009, he toured with Elf Power, and they stayed overnight at my place. While the rest of the band took up the usual spot in the basement, Vic, being wheelchair-bound, slept on the 1st floor couch. I woke early in case anyone needed coffee started, and Vic was already up. We awkwardly sat in the living room together, unable to spark any sort of conversation, until my dogs hopped into his lap. From then on everything was easy. We talked about dogs. Vic could be a bit acerbic, but he softened up. Later I was asking the band to sign the poster from the show, and I asked Vic if he would sign. “It’s an Elf Power poster,” he pointed out, “my name isn’t on it.” He paused. “Yeah, I’ll sign yer poster.” He wrote “Vic” on it. We all ate pancakes together and then they were off (to Chicago, probably). That’s my Vic story.

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Laura Carter/Elf Power: February 17, 2007

Since the band’s inception in 1993, Laura Carter has been the keyboardist for Elf Power, one of the most critically acclaimed bands to emerge from Elephant 6 and the Athens scene in general. But since 1999 she has also been helping to run Orange Twin, a conservation community, record label, and artist’s collective based around a plot of land which is being slowly converted into an eco-village.

1) I’m curious how Orange Twin first formed, and how you came to discover the land Orange Twin is striving to preserve.

We discovered the land for sale, and we fell in love with it and knew it would be a perfect place to start our community. It’s a former girl scout camp about five miles outside of Athens, GA. It’s about 150 acres, 100 of which will be preserved, and the rest of which will be used to build homes.

2) What does it mean that you’ve received approval from Athens-Clarke County for Orange Twin to proceed with its “master plan?” Can you elaborate?

Well, nobody had ever attempted a community like this in Athens before, so we were a little bit concerned about how the county would respond to the idea, but the support has been very enthusiastic. The “master plan” refers to our plan to begin building homes on the land.

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3) Can you briefly describe the history of the community house and its current state of development?

It was a house in Athens that was going to be demolished that we bought for $1 and moved out to the land. It’s a beautiful old house, and there’s currently five people living in it. We’ve had several big concerts over the last few years, hosting bands like Bonnie Prince Billy, Tall Dwarfs and The Olivia Tremor Control when they reunited a few years back.

4) The record label was launched in 2001 and it seems to be thriving, having released records by Jeff Mangum, Elf Power, Gerbils, Major Organ and the Adding Machine, The Late B.P. Helium, Je Suis France, Lovers, and more. What was the initial impetus for launching the label, and who was first involved in putting it together? I’m also curious about how you came to release the Sibylle Baier album, Colour Green.

Andrew and I started the label, initially to reissue the Elyse record, a trippy folk rock record from the late 1960’s that we really loved. Most of the other releases have been from friends looking for an outlet to release their music. The Sibylle Baier album we heard a few years back from J. Mascis of Dinosaur Jr. Sibylle lives near J. in Massachusetts, and her son gave the album to J., who passed it along to us, as he knew we would love it. It is truly a beautiful recording that we thought we should share with the world.

5) What’s on the horizon for Orange Twin in 2007? It sounds like you might be putting out a third Instruments record.

We have new records out by Madeline and the Lovers. Instruments are planning on recording a new record this year, so hopefully that will come out this year as well.

6) Of course, I also have to ask what Elf Power‘s up to.

Elf Power has been recording a record with Vic Chesnutt, backing him up on his songs, which has been a blast. I think it’s going to be a really incredible album. Vic has just finished an album with the Godspeed You Black Emperor! folks in Canada, as well as an acoustic record in Nashville, so I guess this will be the third in his trilogy he hopes to put out this year! We’ll be doing more touring in the spring, going out west for a couple weeks. We’ll also be recording a new Elf Power album later this year, so we’re staying pretty busy!

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Laura photo by John of Diligent Worker

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Zachary Gresham/Summer Hymns: April 10, 2006

Zachary Gresham is the lead singer/songwriter of the Summer Hymns, the Athens-based band that presently includes Philip Brown and Chris Riser (past collaborators have included such familiar Athens names as Derek Almstead of M Coast, Dottie Alexander and Matt Dawson from of Montreal, Adrian Finch and Bren Mead of Masters of the Hemisphere, and about a dozen more). Through three full-lengths–1999’s Voice Brother and Sister, 2001’s A Celebratory Arm Gesture (named after a Mr. Show sketch), and 2003’s Clemency–the band has established a consistently subdued, semi-psychedelic sound, utilizing a unique combination of instruments and an eye toward the album form: no song seems to have a particular ending or beginning until the record stops playing. In the three years since Clemency, the Summer Hymns have been hard at work, and the results should bear much fruit in 2006, as new material will be spread across compilation albums, a Summer Hymns Value Series Vol. 2, a maxi-single, and a fourth full-length album.

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1) How are you progressing on the new album, and when do you expect it to be released?

We are pretty much done with it except for finishing the mixing, which should be done by the end of April. We hope to turn it in May 1st so that it can come out this fall. We’re itching to get back on the road.

2) How long do you typically like to spend on an album before sending it out? I ask because each of your albums has a very cohesive feel, and the songs flow together beautifully.

Thanks. With the exception of Clemency, we’ve pretty much recorded at our own studio so we can take our time. Typically I don’t like for things to drag on as much as we have for this record but generally I just take as long as it takes to make it the record that I want to hear. And usually I seem to write songs in batches, and in this case there have been too many batches to easily focus in on one group of songs.

3) I think we’re both fellow Alejandro Jodorowsky fans, as “El Topo” figures prominently in Clemency, and he gets thanked in the credits. Why did you decide to use this film as a theme for the album? [“El Topo” (“The Mole”), directed by Jodorowsky, can’t really be described, but briefly: it’s a Zen Western from 1970 about a gunfighter who sets out to slay four master warriors who live in the desert; he later seems to die, but is reborn within a mountain, and tunnels his way to the light (and there’s much more). The English dub of the film makes a few cameo appearances on the album, and it influenced the album’s artwork, as well.]

As with a lot of things, it was kinda accidental. When I got that film, I got into it pretty hardcore and watched it a lot. And some of the times it was playing with the sound down low and I was writing some songs on a handheld, and some of it was bleeding through onto the song, and I just got accustomed to hearing some of those things; and then I was inspired by several things in the film, mainly the image of the mole who digs around underground searching for the sunlight, but when he finally gets out from underground he is blinded by the light because he’s been in the darkness so long. On many levels I could relate to that and even wrote a couple of songs directly stemming from thinking about the mole, such as “Wet Mess.” Everyone thinks that it’s about dirty diapers or some sex shit, when it’s just a lament from the mole’s perspective.

4) I try to avoid asking this question, though because the Summer Hymnshave a very unique, hazy, dream-like quality to the music, I will: who do you like to listen to, and what artists would you consider influential?

Lately I’ve been listening to a lot of Bob Dylan stuff from the 70’s and outtakes and stuff. I’ve been digging the new Destroyer record. And I love me some Bill Withers, The Staple Singers, Marvin Gaye, Otis Redding,Larry Norman, etc… I got a turntable that you can stack 6 or 7 LPs and it drops them down, and I don’t think that Robert Wyatt‘s Dondestan has been in its case since I moved last year. Also in that stack is Dylan’s Planet Waves and Paul Simon’s Still Crazy After All These Years. And in the last few weeks I’ve been listening to some Steely Dan Count Down to Ecstacy and ZZ Top‘s Tejas.

5) Do you take a different approach to your songs, or to the band, when you play live?

Yeah, I think so. The songs pretty much have three lives, the life when it’s born with me and whatever instrument I’m writing on, the life that the band brings into it during recording, and then the life after we play it live a bunch. They usually change after playing them live a bunch.

6) Any memorable incidents from the road that you’d like to share?

There’s been a lot of fun times on the road and some of the most memorable I probably shouldn’t share. I love touring and can’t wait to get back out on the road. I would say that the things that come to mind would be staying at Dottie’s aunt and uncle’s farm in Vermont on the Destroyer tour and sitting in their outdoor hot tub heated by a wood-burning stove. And we have had some of the best off days imaginable in Austin, Texas, going to swimming holes and barbeque joints.

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