ALEATORY #20: Casiotone for the Painfully Alone

Owen Ashworth feels your pain.

This is probably why he records so many damn good songs as Casiotone for the Painfully Alone -- as perfect and descriptive a band name as there's ever been. Maybe you've heard his songs, or seen Los Campesinos! lead singer Gareth wear a CFTPA T-shirt in the documentary that came with the group's We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed album, or maybe you'll just see Owen at SXSW this year, or pick up his new rarities album Advance Base Battery Life on March 10th, or maybe even pick up his new new album Vs. Children in April. No matter what though, Owen's aesthetic -- after all these years -- remains almost exactly the same: plug in a keyboard, turn on the mic, and just play it baby. We feel for you.

Congratulations to both him and us: this Globecat's 20th Aleatory -- thanks guys.

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4. Favorite person to have worked with?

I used to work in a bakery with a woman named Kara who was really funny and great. we ate a lot of damaged baked goods together.

10. Favorite lyric?

I ain't no goddamn son of a bitch you better think about it baby

13. Favorite Shakespearean play?

Cats

14. Favorite sound?

Flute samples played in chords

15. Favorite exhibit or subject at the museum?

Wild animal taxidermy dioramas in natural history museums

17. Favorite plant?

I think it's a tie between kudzu and basil

39. What's something you could probably beat anyone you know at?

I don't mean to brag but I am very good at cribbage

40. What was your best/worst subject in school?

I took some anthropology classes in college that I did pretty well in. I never skipped my anthropology classes. I have never done very well with math. I skipped lots of math.

42. What's an image that haunts you to this day?

There was a picture of a dude who had done a mess of PCP and then cut off his face and fed it to his dogs. I saw it on the internet. I still think about it every once in a while and go "ugh" or "ack." Once you put something in your brain you can never take it out again, kids. Think twice before clicking those warning disturbing image links on www.snopes.com.

43. What's the road ahead look like?

It is covered with snow and hazardous

44. Something you've heard, know is false, but wish were true with all your heart?

I heard that polar bears hide their black noses with a front paw or leg when they hunt. This helps them blend in with the snow so they can sneak up on school children or seals or whatever. Sort of like a reverse negative Dracula. Polar Drac. I'm pretty sure this is not true but the image is too endearing and chilling to not want to believe in.

49. Now that you know a much larger audience will get to hear the music you've made, has your writing changed at all? How? What's changed and what's stayed the same?

Oh man I don't know. I think the biggest factor that has changed my writing has been my age. I get older and I think about different things so I want to sing about different things. Also, once you've written a song, you can't go around rewriting it forever so you actually have to come up with some different ideas every once in a while. I am averaging about thirty songs per idea these days.

54. So far in your career, what's been your proudest accomplishment?

Playing in Russia felt pretty nuts. I feel weird listing any names but there have been some people who I have been very proud to have met and shared mutual admiration with. Okay fine Tom Hanks.

57. Most rock star thing you've ever done?

I accidentally knocked all of my equipment off of a stage and the people in the front caught it and pushed it back upright. And everybody thought it was on purpose and some kind of cool trick. IT WAS NOT A COOL TRICK

63. Band/artist you're secretly envious of?

My friend Nick from No Kids because he lives in Canada and gets all kinds of amazing government grants to record expensive andfabulous sounding records. Also, because I would like to be able to play piano like him. I am pretty lousy musician and I am envious of lots of people's musical abilities.

67. Do you reach any kind of personal catharsis when it comes to songwriting/performing?

Yeah, I guess so

78. Your life has been reduced to a bumper sticker: what does it say?

NPR

92. Which venue are you dying to play but have not yet had the chance to?

I would like to play at the Warfield in San Francisco, CA. I saw Kraftwerk play there once and I hear it's haunted.

94. What's your hardest song to replicate live?

There are a few songs on my new record that were arranged for many more hands than I have. I haven't tried to play them live yet and I really don't know what to do with them. There are also plenty of old songs of mine that I just don't like to play because I just don't really like them anymore. I would find it hard to replicate those songs with any sort of sincerity, even though they aren't particularly difficult to play.

99. Licensing your music out to companies for TV ads: good or bad?

Shit I don't know. I haven't done it yet but maybe if I have a kid who needs braces some day I'll feel differently. You pick your battles, you know?

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Visit Casiotone for the Painfully Alone's website.

ALEATORY #19: Jason Robert Brown

Tony-winning composer Jason Robert Brown is bored.

After all, the man has released quite a few albums, has created one of the single greatest pocket musicals of all time (The Last Five Years), and even picked up the theatre-world's highest honor when he penned the score for Parade, still a theatrical staple all these years later. Nowadays, it seems that the last thing that JRB wants to do is what's expected of him -- he's now taking risks both big and small to keep things interesting.. He contributed songs to the big-budget, Tony-nominated production of Urban Cowboy and most recently can be seen writing tunes for 13, the kid-oriented/acted/performed musical that premiered at the prestigious Mark Taper Forum and has since made its away to Broadway. Yet now, Jason takes on his greatest challenge: responding to the latest Globecat Aleatory!

(Jason enters Stage Left and recites the following ...)

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2. Favorite board game?

I am a mediocre but avid Scrabblist, and my wife and I used to have epic hostile Scrabble matches, but I travel so much these days that board games are impractical on any consistent basis. I do a lot of Scrabbling and Scrambling on Facebook, but while it is infinitely more addicting, it's ultimately less gratifying.

4. Favorite person to have worked with?

In 2001, I got to work with Jon Hendricks, the legendary vocalese writer and singer; Jon sang the vocal parts on the incidental music I wrote for David Lindsay-Abaire's play "Kimberly Akimbo," which included the song "Grow Old With Me." I grew up listening to Lambert, Hendricks & Ross (as well as the version of that group that included Yolande Bavan) and, in fact, most of my knowledge of bebop repertoire comes from having known the vocalized versions first. (I may be the only musician who hears Miles Davis's "Freddie Freeloader" and thinks of the lyrics, thanks to Hendricks's monumental recording of it with Bobby McFerrin, Al Jarreau and George Benson.) Unlike working with movie stars or rock stars, working with jazz legends turns out to be fairly easy: you pick up the phone and call them. Someone I knew had Jon's manager's number, somehow that led me to Jon's home phone, I called him, offered him a thousand bucks to come sing for three hours, and voilà, I had a recording of one of my heroes singing one of my songs. And Jon was a lot of fun to hang out with that day as well, smart and fast and game for anything (at one point, he was making bird and monkey noises).

5. Favorite piece of equipment?

I'm unapologetically analog in most of my habits, though I readily the concede the convenience and fluidity of the digital world. Nonetheless, in order to do my work, I need a piano, a bunch of 2B pencils, a pencil sharpener, staff paper, and a drafting ruler, all of which (except the piano) I travel with at all times. Of those, the piano is the most important, and my favorite piece of equipment therefore is the Yamaha C5 that sits in our backyard studio.

9. Favorite song to start (or end) a mixtape with?

Mixtape? I haven't made one since I was 22. I remember making one for my Dad right after I left college that started with Fred Astaire's recording of Irving Berlin's "I'd Rather Lead A Band." And ended with Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong doing Gershwin's "A Foggy Day," which is a song my Dad always sang with me when I was a kid.

11. Favorite music video?

I wouldn't even know where to see a music video these days, outside of YouTube, I guess. I was growing up when MTV first came on the air, so I tend to have a very proprietary sense of music videos – I was an early adopter! In that vein, whatever I offer will be sort of hopelessly unhip, as though I stopped paying attention twenty years ago, which in fact is the case. But coolness be damned: "Sledgehammer" by Peter Gabriel, still the winner by a mile.

15. Favorite exhibit or subject at the museum?

I've seen two separate exhibits on the work of Henry Darger, which I find endlessly fascinating. It's not just the no-formal-training thing (which, to be honest, annoys me no end when people claim that as a virtue), it's more the unfiltered imagination, and the willingness to improvise new tools when his own technique isn't sufficient. And the whole self-contained mythology of the work is inspiring in its own way.

18. Favorite pick-up line?

That I've used myself or that someone's used on me? I don't think I ever had a repertoire of pick-up lines for my own personal use, I'm horrifically shy when it comes to women. Nor have I really been picked up, though I did have one girl ask me to sign her boobs after a concert once. That was killer. (I didn't do it. Maybe her boobs weren't big enough for my whole name?)

27. Favorite chord/chord progression?

Neil Finn does this thing all the time where he's been sitting in a minor key and then just pops in to the relative major, and it's always the most delightful moment. You can hear it in Crowded House's "When You Come," right at the top of the chorus: "And that is why" (there's the minor) "I stumble to my knee-ees!" (there's the major). So satisfying. I steal it whenever I remember to; certainly in "Over," I do it right in the verse.

29. Who do you wish more people were listening to?

Kate McGarry, incredible jazz singer, though "jazz" is too confining a label to put on the work she does; she and her husband, guitarist Keith Ganz, are brilliant interpreters and very deep souls. And Kate's songwriting is very strong and very fresh.

31. Other than musician, what career would you most enjoy?

Ultimately, I think music is just the outlet I generally choose for my creativity, but I live to create, and if it weren't music, it would be something else. As mercurial as I am, whatever I would most enjoy today would make me crazy by the middle of next year.

34. What's the best joke you heard recently?

I've been telling this one for a while now, but it's a winner, courtesy of David Evans (who is the world's foremost joke-teller):

Mr. Lipkin hasn't been to the doctor in a long time, finally he decides it's time for a checkup. He goes in to the doctor's office, the doctors says to him, "All right, Mr. Lipkin, it's been quite a while, we're gonna need some things. We're gonna need a blood sample, a urine sample, a semen sample, and a stool sample." Mr. Lipkin looks at the doctor and says, "Should I just give you my shorts?"

36. Lyrics first or music first?

I get asked this question so often I should probably come up with an interesting answer. Really, what comes first is generally the title. That may not be the title I finally end up with, but I need someplace to start, and usually a good phrase is the best medicine. If I can encapsulate what I want the song to say in a couple of words, then I always know where I'm heading. From there, I'll start determining a musical energy, a particular style; that's decided as much by the character and the situation and the moment in the plot as by my own whimsy. And once I have that "groove" (which may or may not be very groovy), I'll start singing a melody to it, appending the title whenever it feels appropriate. I've been describing that process that way for so long that it's really no longer accurate, at least not always, but it still sounds like a good answer.

46. Where do you keep things hidden? What do you keep hidden there?

Well, now, if I told you...

48. Biggest moment of triumph?

Honestly this: when the woman who was to be my wife and the mother of my child first kissed me, in Atlanta, Georgia, in 2000.

61. What's the best advice you could give to a young, upstart composer?

Write SONGS. Too many theater composers feel the need to write huge sequences without any sense of the underlying structure. Songs, songs, songs. If you can master AABA, you can stretch it any way you want.

63. Band/artist you're secretly envious of?

Secretly? I'm the most openly envious person I know. What good is envy if you're gonna keep it all inside? And furthermore, why just direct it at one band or artist? I'm envious of everyone, all the time. Keeps the creative juices flowing.

64. Weirdest promotion you've been a part of?

Honestly, nothing comes to mind.

75. Very first song that you ever wrote?

I think when I was eight years old, I wrote a song called "Come Back To Me," which told the story of a lovelorn young man desperate for the return of his girl, Jenny. (I did not know a girl named Jenny at the time, at least not well enough for me to immortalize her in song.) The chords, moving every two beats, were C, Bdim, Am, G, F, G, C. I thought I was the first person to come up with those changes.

79. Best concert you've ever been to?

In the same week in (I think) 1997, I saw Michel Petrucciani play Birdland with Anthony Jackson and Steve Gadd AND I saw Aretha Franklin do a gospel concert at Avery Fisher Hall. To see musicianship at that high a level up close, twice in one week, really raised the bar for me. Aretha only did a half-hour long set, but it was still clear that she wasn't coasting or faking – she was feeling it, she was reaching for it, and whatever she needed to express, she had the tools to do it; and Petrucciani played with such inventiveness, such tastefulness, and such unbelievable groove that I redefined my sense of what jazz piano was supposed to be just from that one concert. So: not a bad week.

87. Ultimately, you will want to be remembered as …

At the moment, I'll say I want to be remembered as a musician. When people write about the theater, so much of the focus is on the words, the acting, the singing; I write for the theater by going from the music out. If you don't understand the music I'm writing, then you won't understand the levels of theater I'm creating, and I feel that, all too often, the music just gets lost in the discussion. So I'd like to be remembered as a guy who put a lot of serious thought into how to make the music part of the theater, and how to make all the parts breathe together with the music leading the way.

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Visit Jason Robert Brown's website.

ALEATORY #13: Pale Young Gentlemen

This is a first.

Here at Globecat, we receive e-mails all the time -- be it publicists, readers like you, or even band members themsleves: we happily sift through all of these, but something was quite different when Pale Young Gentlemen drummer Matt Reisenauer contacted us, eagerly discussing the second disc from his band's album Black Forest (Tra La La). We followed up on the lead, and soon found Black Forest to be a tragically beautiful album of indie-folk done right: dramatic without being theatrical, touching without being self-serving. Ripe with cellos, acoustic guitars, and singer Mike Reisenauer's pointed vocals, this is the kind of disc that will sound just as good five years from now as it will when you pick it up later this month. Yes, this is the first time we've featured an artist who has contacted us instead of the other way around, but, really, this is the first band to contact us who genuinely deserves to be on our Aleatory wall. Mike R. takes this opportunity to gladly discuss re-recording radio interviews, the big spoiler he knows about wolf packs, and how Rufus Wainwright gave one of the worst concerts he ever saw ...

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20. Favorite new band?

Our old bass player (Andy Brawner) left the band to work on his own stuff. He released an album called "A Sun Goes Down" as Time Since Western that is amazing.

27. Favorite chord/chord progression?

Any half-diminished chord. Most chords/chord progression have a lot of baggage- they're hard to make your own- but these things add a lot of nuance, I think, so ended up using them a lot on the new record.

30. How many languages do you speak?

One and a half. For some reason, I remember a lot of the Spanish I learned in middle and high school. Or at least I think I remember it. Or at least nobody I knows more than I do and feels alright correcting me.

32. Best thing you learned this week/month?

I saw a thing on PBS about the origin of dogs and how they split from wolves. I won't ruin it for you, but a nicely done show.

36. Lyrics first or music first?

Same time. Back and forth. Like two young boys trying to outrun each other.

39. What's something you could probably beat anyone you know at?

I'm really good at trying to be funny.

40. What was your best/worst subject in school?

Who cares?

42. What's an image that haunts you to this day?

Once I saw a dog get hit by a car as I was pumping gas, a springer- spaniel, I think. It was very dramatic from start to finish.

44. Something you've heard, know is false, but wish were true with all your heart?

That people still listen to entire albums. I wish we were limited to 8-track players sometimes. Make everyone listen to the whole side at least.

45. What's the best lie you've ever told?

My brother and I used to be clowns with my dad. We'd perform skits and tricks on the street. This is totally true. Anyway, fooling another person with a magic trick has to be the most pleasant, guilt-free lie possible.

48. Biggest moment of triumph?

I think I'm still waiting for this one...

57. Most rock star thing you've ever done?

When I was six, my mother told me to take my little garbage can up to my room. I paused and said "No you". My mom reacted in such a way that has prevented any more rock star moments.

60. What's the worst show you've ever played? What would you have done different?

Once we played a show as a three-piece that was all-the-way embarrassing. Christ, we really should have rehearsed. I still regret it.

63. Band/artist you're secretly envious of?

Anybody that's actually making a living at this.

68. Favorite interview you've ever been a part of (aside from this one, obviously)?

We did an interview once for a local radio station that was being taped for a later airing, but the interviewer forgot to press record for the first 40 mins. of it. It's not a terrible thing to lose 40 minutes, but it is weird to re-answer the same questions and try to seem genuine. We ended up with a big inside joke we couldn't share with the audience.

69. There's got to be one: who has been your craziest fan?

We had a fan in Chicago once that wanted to pay us a hundred bucks to play "Clap Your Hands" again. We didn't do it, but maybe we should have.

84. Most disappointing concert you ever attended?

I once saw Rufus Wainwright at the Barrymore Theater. I think I remember wanting him to shut up and play the songs. The whole thing seemed kinda cheesy or something.

87. Ultimately, you will want to be remembered as …

Somebody's dad who wrote some nice songs.

96. The one thing that no one knows about you (yet)?

I am a fantastic cook and I'm really great at driving cars.

97. Your label wants to do a music video for a song off your album, and have inexplicably procured $1,000,000 as a budget, then decide that you'd best direct the visual accompaniment to your own music. What song do you choose, and what will your video look like?

I'd keep the money, split it with my band, and have my dad shoot it for free. I'd probably want to do "Kettle Drum" or "She's All Mine, I Think" because I've always pictured those songs taking place on my dad's property in rural Wisconsin.

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Visit the Pale Young Gentlemen's website.

ALEATORY #12: Grails

It's been a busy year for Grails, and it's not over yet. Back in May, the Portland four piece dropped their fifth full-length in as many years, Take Refuge in Clean Living, pushing their grungy instrumental psych into new and groovy places. In October, their sixth album, Doomsdayer's Holiday, comes out on Temporary Residence. And their 2005 EP, Interpretations of Three Psychedelic Rock Songs from Around the World, was just pressed re-released and pressed vinyl. They also toured with Nadja in June, are hitting up Athens, GA and NY in November, and in the meantime are probably working triple shifts at their day jobs, just because they can. Three of the Grails guys—guitarist Alex Hall, drummer Emil Amos, and keys-man William Slater—took a breather from their hectic schedule and were kind enough to be our twelfth Aleatory.

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12. Favorite band when you were in high school?

AH: Split decision between Metallica and (old) Van Halen.
EA: Dinosaur.
WS: Drive Like Jehu, Public Enemy.

13. Favorite Shakespearean play?

AH: Porky's 3.
EA: Zardoz.
WS: Henry IV.

15. Favorite exhibit or subject at the museum?
WS: Very old books and forgotten manuscripts. Sea monsters of the late cretaceous.

16. Favorite campfire story?
AH: Hamlet.
EA: "Eight O'Clock in the Morning" - Ray Nelson.

17. Favorite plant?
AH: Robert.
EA: Francis.
WS: Treebeard.

19. Favorite foreign film?
AH: Irreversible.
EA: The Bird with the Crystal Plumage.
WS: The Lady Vanishes, Throne of Blood.

28. What instrument would you most like to learn to play?

WS: Flute, maybe cello.
AH: It'd be nice to actually learn guitar at some point.
EA: Either a ham-radio or some Harry Partch shit maybe.

60. What's the worst show you've ever played? What would you have done different?
AH: Eureka, California, 2004, I think. It was in some Italian restaurant. An hour before the show, our violinist ate a handful of mixed scrip drugs he had scored off some dude on the sidewalk. By the time we started to play he was still in the van, writhing in the backseat and clawing at the air. He kept losing consciousness during the set with his violin shrieking a wall of feedback. After the show he passed out in the car and we couldn't wake him up. Eventually he came to at 4 AM, and was furious because it was freezing outside, he didn't know where he was and he filled my voicemail with about 20 hateful, threatening messages.

EA: The time I remember feeling the worst was in around 2001 when someone put the loop for a song called "Canyon Hymn" on a cassette. Since all tape player motors play at slightly different speeds the sound man hit play and we slogged thru 8 minutes completely out of tune with it. I remember experiencing an intense/unparalleled degree of shame while I was putting my cymbals away.

WS: The aforementioned two were the first two that came to mind… Honorable mentions to the show where the very heavy Rhodes organ collapsed on top of me mid-song, trapping me beneath, and the show where i played despite having a 102 degree fever, during which our violinist flipped me off repeatedly from the other side of the stage because he didn't like the set list I'd written. I remember that one as somewhat of a Robitussin-induced waking nightmare.

63. Band/artist you're secretly envious of?

EA: I'll speak for Alex on this one and say it's a tie between Rita Coolidge and Clay Aiken.

71. How well do you feel your music lends itself to remixing or being covered?
AH: I hope that someone might actually cover a Grails tune one day, since it might confirm that we'd succeeded in making an actual song. Most instrumental music these days is either just riffs or drones, rarely ever real songs....

81. If you could sync an album of yours to a movie (like Dark Side of the Moon and The Wizard of Oz), what movie would it be?
EA: Emanuelle and the Last Cannibals
WS: Dirty Dancing

93. Longest show you ever played? What was different?
AH: We've played probably a dozen shows in Europe where the promoter hadn't bothered to add any support bands, leaving us as the sole 'entertainers' for the evening. So we were obligated to go total GBV and play really long sets....which is fun for us but bad for the Italian people who are waiting for the techno DJ that's going on after the rock show.

95. Do you ever read your own reviews?
AH: Yeah, always. I've never understood the idea that a lot of people have about separating oneself from one's criticism. It's just part of the process.

EA: With the amount of dispassionate publicity you generally receive, we mostly just end up reading our own press releases that've been copied and pasted 4000 times. Between that, deleting spam and shredding junk mail modern life has become a refreshing break from reading Kafka. When there's not much tangible community left in the underground it makes us sentimental to watch old videos of the crowd spitting upon the faces of the members of Fear.

98. Would you say that there's somewhat of a political undertone to your music? If so, what motivates it?
AH: You mean in a topical sense? No, we don't have any 'Bush is bad' songs. Music like ours is more about focusing inward than outward. It's head music that benefits from a generous amount of dissociation.

100. Even with the gradual decay of the B-side, most artists still have vaults of unreleased songs. What's in yours?
AH: A lot of stuff that will stay unreleased for good reason. But the rest is being compiled into a DVD project that should be out some time next year.

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Visit Grails' website.
Visit Grails' MySpace.

ALEATORY #9: Do Make Say Think

Since the 1998 release of their self-titled debut, Do Make Say Think have been a key member of Constellation Records' stable. On a label that is also home to such acts as A Silver Mt. Zion, godspeed you! black emperor, and Sandro Perri (Polmo Polpo, Glissandro 70), it takes a special sort of band to stand out among all the rest of the incredible talent Constellation has signed.

Do Make Say Think is that sort of band.

Combining the post-rock of their labelmates with elements of jazz, touches of electronics, and above all, incredible technical prowess, DMST was able to pull more emotion out of their instrumental rock than bands with tomes of lyrics. So what did they do? On last year's fantastic You, You're a History of Rust (firmly in Davecat's top five albums of 2007), they added vocals to two of the tracks, including absolutely transcendent disc-closer "In Mind," and proved they can grow in ways no one had imagined.

Taking a break from blowing minds long enough to be the subject of our ninth Aleatory is guitarist Justin Small, who, like all Canadians (if current trends are any indication), has more than one band, also drumming for hardcore soul group (and Constellation-signees) Lullabye Arkestra. He's not as great as I say he is.

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13. Favorite Shakespearean play?

Ugggg... I hate Shakespeare. In fact I hate theatre. Really, I'm sorry but it's true. I appreciate the effort that goes into acting on stage but, I don't know why. I just don't get on with actors.

16. Favorite campfire story?

I'm gonna be sitting next to a campfire tomorrow. Yea!
Ummm....
I'll probably talk a lot of shit because I'll be hammered.
I'll re-tell the story of the bird that recently got caught in my bedroom and survived slamming into every wall, escaping my cat, and me hitting it with a broom (by accident, I was trying to guide it out and smacked it on the head. I felt awful)
p.s. the story gets louder each time I tell it.

21. Favorite album(s) from the past year?

I work at a record store, so it's favorite album of the week.
This week
DEATH BREATH's Let It Stink. It's the dude from Hellacopters and Entombed doing old school black metal in [the] vein of Venom and Celtic Frost. It's awesome and all the songs are about zombies!
So it's not death metal it's un-dead metal!!!
There are too many good records to mention. Get away from your fucking computer and visit and support your local record store. It's fun.

25. Favorite historical figure?

Tommy Douglas
He's the reason we have health care in Canada.
http://www.cbc.ca/greatest/top_ten/nominee/douglas-tommy.html

33. What's something you could teach anyone in an hour or less?

How to build a campfire. I love doing it and I do it well.

41. If you could go anywhere in the universe, where would it be?

Actually, the sun is shining and I'm inside writing on a computer. I want to be at Ronnie's Patio. That's a bar in the Kensington Market area of Toronto.

48. Biggest moment of triumph?

Marrying Kat Taylor.

51. What are you currently obsessed with?

Hangovers.
I don't want to be but it seems I can't help myself. Damn delicious beer.
Also riding my bike. I have a sweet ride.

55. You're curating a festival. If you could choose any two bands to open for you, who would they be?

Good one.
A re-united Talk Talk, Laughing Stock era.
And this one man band from France called Andre Duracell
Check out this Lightning Bolt cover:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uI7vt_bPib0

62. Your favorite song that you've done so far?

The song Kat walked down the aisle to.
And we just wrote an awesome Lullabye Arkestra jam called 'get nervous'

63. Band/artist you're secretly envious of?

Silver Mount Zion. Have you seen them live??? Holy shit.

66. Worst song you've heard recently?

I cannot stand Joanna Newsom. Sorry. In fact that whole scene of 'pretty-girl-singing-like-a-10 year old' bugs the shit out of me. Can't stand it.

67. Do you reach any kind of personal catharsis when it comes to songwriting/performing?

Yes, of course.
You have to. In order for you to complete a song your heart must be open to it. Otherwise you are just pretending to play music. You are acting music.

68. Favorite interview you've ever been a part of (aside from this one, obviously)?

This one is going swimmingly. So let's not talk about past loves and ruin the moment. o.k.?

78. Your life has been reduced to a bumper sticker: what does it say?

Umm
"If you cannot move your body, your soul cannot be saved"
Or one of those Jesus fish holding a beer.

84. Most disappointing concert you ever attended?

Palace Brothers way back in '96 (?) at Lee's Palace. In Toronto.
I was soooooo into Palace at the time. And apparently Will Oldham had fired his band before arriving and instead of doing it solo hired these new-rock assholes to back him. Total disaster.

86. With Radiohead's In Rainbows release and Nine Inch Nails doing boffo business with his online releases, do you see yourself ever doing some alternative kind of release for any of your future projects?

Sure.
Just as long as there's also a vinyl release as well. I just got a new needle for my turn table and music has never sounded better.

88. What's your deepest source for musical inspiration?

Love and fear.

89. You just died. I'm sorry. Fortunately, your will states that you want very specific music to be played at your funeral. What did you choose?

"Highway to the Danger Zone" by Kenny Loggins. From the Top Gun soundtrack.

95. Do you ever read your own reviews?

Yes.
I'm really not as great as everybody says I am.

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Visit Do Make Say Think's website.

ALEATORY #8: Titles

... and in step the indie-rockers. With a laid-back style the mixes both backwoods rock drawl with indie quirkiness, guitarist Brad Amorosio began working as Titles after his previous Connecticut college rock act bailed out. Soon, with the help of drummer John Miller, a fleshed-out sound emerged, and as of later this year, a new album as well. Brad sits down with Globecat to take part in its eigth Aleatory ...

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1. Favorite word?

I don't know. [Editor's Note: That's actually three words.]

5. Favorite piece of equipment?

1960 Gretsch Clipper.

14. Favorite sound?

Lightsabers.

26. Favorite badass?

Daniel Day-Lewis in Gangs of New York.

45. What's the best lie you've ever told?

Probably something on a job interview.

53. So far in your career, what's been your biggest regret?

No regrets.

54. So far in your career, what's been your proudest accomplishment?

Putting out our last record.

60. What's the worst show you've ever played? What would you have done different?

They are all OK. Even the worst ones have some value.

63. Band/artist you're secretly envious of?

It would be fun to float on the crowd in an inflatable bubble.

65. Ever see yourself penning the score/soundtrack to a TV show or film?

Not anytime soon.

76. Dream collaboration?

When is that Dangerhorse record coming out?

82. Current pop song that you would file under "guilty pleasure"?

I liked that Jessica Simpson song with the roller rink video ["A Public Affair"].

89. You just died. I'm sorry. Fortunately, your will states that you want very specific music to be played at your funeral. What did you choose?

"Hello Goodbye"

90. Sexiest thing about you?

Post nasal drip.

91. Which single album should be in everybody's home?

The first Huey Lewis and the News record.

97. Your label wants to do a music video for a song off your album, and have inexplicably procured $1,000,000 as a budget, then decide that you'd best direct the visual accompaniment to your own music. What song do you choose, and what will your video look like?

We'd probably do something with animatronic dinosaurs.

99. Licensing your music out to companies for TV ads: good or bad?

Depends what the ad is for. Car insurance? Hamburgers? Sure, what the hell.

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Visit Titles' website.

ALEATORY #1: Phil Elvrum

Few discographies are as intimidating as Phil Elvrum's. As The Microphones (and later as Mount Eerie), Elvrum crafts nothing but powerful, complex indie-rock epics that transcend their bare-bones recording environments to become something far more orchestral in nature. As a producer, he's helped create soundscapes for artists like Mirah, Little Wings, and Beat Happening. As an interviewee, he becomes the first subject of the Globecat Aleatory -- that famed list of 20 randomized questions -- and his responses are as wickedly funny as they are surprisingly insightful. Ladies and gentlemen: Phil Elvrum.

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1. Favorite word?

The word "favorite" is terrifying for me. I can not choose favorites. I can't say "best" except in ironic hyperbole. So all these answers are not favorite or best or worst or anything. They are just one answer of many. I hope I make sense.

4. Favorite person to have worked with?

Julie Doiron, recently.

5. Favorite piece of equipment?

Printing press.

7. Favorite composer?

G.I. Gurdjieff & Thomas deHartmann.

12. Favorite band when you were in high school?

Eric's Trip.

13. Favorite Shakespearean play?

Macbeth.

15. Favorite exhibit or subject at the museum?

The entire Museum of Jurassic Technology in LA.

29. Who do you wish more people were listening to?

Gary Snyder.

32. Best thing you learned this week/month?

French.

52. At what point did you realize that music was going to be your full-time occupation?

Still haven't.

60. What's the worst show you've ever played? What would you have done different?

So many horrible ones I can't choose. In many cases nothing could have been done.

63. Band/artist you're secretly envious of?

secret

66. Worst song you've heard recently?

"Lisa, It's Your Birthday" by "Michael Jackson" in that one Simpsons episode.

71. How well do you feel your music lends itself to remixing or being covered?

Poorly. My songs are too much about my own weird shit. It would seem weird coming from someone else. Remixes would be fine though I think.

73. Are there any songs that you're working on right now?

Yes.

82. Current pop song that you would file under "guilty pleasure"?

I feel no guilt. I love so much weird normal people stuff. It's just music.

89. You just died. I'm sorry. Fortunately, your will states that you want very specific music to be played at your funeral. What did you choose?

Sunn O)))

92. Which venue are you dying to play but have not yet had the chance to?

I would like to play on the Earth's moon.

96. The one thing that no one knows about you (yet)?

I just ate a burrito.

98. Would you say that there's somewhat of a political undertone to your music? If so, what motivates it?

Maybe, yes. I feel like we humans could do better. I am motivated to say what I think because people are paying attention to me.

99. Licensing your music out to companies for TV ads: good or bad?

In most cases bad. But what if it was a TV ad for something I really felt ethically obliged to help promote? Like a tall frosty Heineken?

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Visit Phil Elvrum's website.