Stephen Malkmus

Yea. I’m just chilling in an apartment doing interviews. SuicideGirls is from Portland, right?

That’s where I live mainly.

I’ve looked on it before but I don’t have a password.

Yeah she’s back there crying.

I have one.

Pretty good. She’s like freshly hatched. 11 weeks.

Yeah, she’s cool. She doesn’t seem to be fussy.

She doesn’t like indie rock. She doesn’t like metal. She likes just mellow singer/songwriter, softer stuff.

That can change. People tell me that I may have to get these baby music CDs and stuff.

I would. I’ll get her whatever she wants.

Well they have the baby know-it-all moms. They’re always giving you advice about what you’re going to need.

That’s pretty funny

Well she came here with us to New York. But she’s not going to come with me on the tour. I’m touring in June so it’s back to the good old fashioned SuicideGirl decadence.

Yeah, it’s in your face.

I just wanted to tear-it-up a little bit. Not be all soft and touchy feely or something because, that’s not the sound of young Portland, as far as I’m concerned or the sound of Old Steve. It’s time to shred a little bit.

With the last album The Jicks made, I thought it was cool that the recording style was this expensive studio recording and had a kind of a light brown sound or something. This time I just wanted to be more thrust in your face sound like speaker sound, closer microphone and a little trashier.

Yeah, they put you on a treadmill when you sign for Matador. It just goes around slowly like a really slow Ferris wheel and then your number comes up and you’re allowed to put out a record.

I could do it every year. But I’m already in people’s face up for 14 years and so there’s enough. It’s just like if you’re playing a pick-up basketball game you shouldn’t just like shoot three pointers every time, especially if your field goal percentage is less than 50 percent. So we like to share the ball.

Not necessarily. There are some lyrics on this record that are pretty sincere and somewhat deep. But I think the general tone for me is to take a stab at things that are within my reach. Like I won’t fight with you if you’re outside my punching range and if you are, watch out! [laughs]

I did this record in my house and I had no one there. The band was around on some of the songs, but I was just fooling around and seeing how the vocals would be if I tried this and that. It was pretty cool and fun way to work.

I always had some pretty fancy recording equipment but I never had time to use it. I’ve always tried to go to different places and work with different people just to take chances and not repeat myself with environments and extra bodies, like engineers [laughs]. I hadn’t played that card yet, that work at your house at your own pace card and I thought I could do that this time. I won’t do it again but it was pretty fun.

It changed things a lot because if you go to a studio you’re more prepared and you plan out things. With this I could really think on my feet. For this I just worked on each song until it was almost done then I would move on.

It’s hard to say. They played on three of the songs. We are a band. I wouldn’t be able to do this without the drummer and the bass player so their photos are in there. But I didn’t really ask all of the time “should we do this.” It was more of a solo thing but I guess half and half. Some of the better songs, the long one called “No More Shoes” and this one called “It Kills” and “Mama” are band songs that we rehearsed and played live well before I recorded the record and most of the rest I kind of just threw down on tape with just the help of the drummer.

They’re just hot chicks from a 70’s porn magazine that I bought on 82nd Street in Portland. It’s from this really lonely shop. In Portland they have this one place called Fantasies right downtown and they have things for dudes to go and get blowjobs and stuff. But this one is really gross; it’s probably where you go if you don’t want to be seen.

So I just went down and this dude had all these magazines that he was selling for like $2. The girls in it look sort of like Janis Joplin hippie chicks. They look kind of skanky for one of the better adjectives.

It’s hard to say. I think the farther you get away from media centers or where people fancy themselves to be hip or something the more it’s going to be just Pavement fans. When we play in LA or NY or Portland, there are new fans.

Yeah, we’re solid.

Maybe in September

Mostly recreation. I play basketball, softball. We go hiking and play darts.

I collect records.

I go looking for old stuff.

Sometimes, Portland’s got some good places. I find shit all of the time in Portland. It makes me happy for a week.

by Daniel Robert Epstein

SG Username: AndersWolleck