So who are these guys?
Via Audio’s upturn began a couple years back after a chance encounter with Eno after a gig in Boston—vocalist and Berklee School of Music student Jessica Martins chatted him up at stage side and gave him a demo of songs. Six months later, the band received an email from the guitarist, asking to meet and eventually record an album at Public Hi-Fi Studios, the all-analog lab where Eno has laid down tracks with Mates of State, Maria Taylor and What Made Milwaukee Famous (as well as every Spoon album).
The twelve songs VA recorded during the two-week session have all the earmarks of a baby Spoon release: lush arrangements, math-y switches, moments of beautiful distortion finding its way into the mix, and, most importantly, grooves. Standout track “From Cloud” opens with a sweet boy/girl harmonies before being tag-teamed with drummer Danny Molad’s pitter patter style beats, which then segue into an explosive disco breakdown. It’s just the sort of intelligent and inspired arrangement one would expect from music school nerds. We spoke with Molad, chilling in Brooklyn before soon hitting the road with White Rabbits, about his Austin stories, scanning Brit Daniel’s iPod and playing for a room full of three-year olds.
You were discovered by Spoon guitarist and production maestro Jim Eno after he received your album at a show. That’s some luck…
Jessica was at a Spoon show in Boston and happened to have our CD on her and went up to the stage and called out to Jim, who was still packing up his shit, and gave him the album. He was kind of startled, but took it. A few months later we received an email from him asking. The stars sorta aligned.
So he emails you and asks to record an album…like on the spot?
He actually came to see us play in San Francisco and we talked after and it clicked really well. We all got along and really appreciated how he was so thorough about everything. And so we ended up going down to Austin for a couple weeks to record the album.
What’s it like hanging out in Austin with one of the guys from Spoon…easily the best band in town?
It’s not like we walked around advertising that we were hanging out with Jim Eno. But he definitely got a few looks here and there. Austin is great. It’s full of all these beer swilling jocks and granola girls and post-modern hippies. It’s a unique mix.
Was [Spoon frontman] Brit Daniel around?
No, he actually lives in Portland now. But his mom did make us chocolate chip cookies…actually, I don’t know if they were for us, but they were in the studio and we ate them. And Brit’s iPod was there.
Did you listen to any super-secret un-heard Spoon songs?
There was definitely some stuff on there we weren’t supposed to listen to. There was definitely a lot of Gang of Four on there.
You pretty much have the worst hard drive failure horror story I’ve ever heard…
We were unloading gear at our rehearsal space and for some reason my laptop bag, which held my laptop and backup external hard drive, was somehow left on the curb. We went in to rehearse and at the end I realized what had happened and rushed outside to find it gone. We lost about three quarters of the album, so it was a pretty big heartbreaker for all of us. But this was before we started working with Jim, so I guess it was a good thing. We rehashed a bunch of the lost material.
What’s your day job?
I work a number of jobs, including as a broadcast engineer for WNYC. I also drum for this group called the Little Maestros, which is a program where we play songs for kids, ranging from three months to three years. We will play anything from ABC songs to covers like “Footloose” and “Signed, Sealed, Delivered.” The songs are ridiculously simple, especially for a drummer. We learn them like 30 minutes before the class.
Are you fans of other preposition-fronted bands like Of Montreal, At The Drive-In or, possibly, From Autumn to Ashes?
Yeah…um….yeah, I was into At The Drive-In when they released that album that was going to save rock and roll a few years back.
Add a comment