Music > Interviews
Interview with Cold Specks
08/10/12
Listening to ‘I Predict a Graceful Expulsion’ is like listening to the absolute ideal conclusion to 100 years of gospel music, 100 years of blues and 60 years of soul. Not to say it’s any one of these things at all, but you can follow your finger along the dusty paths they wove to where Al Spx, aka Cold Specks has taken them now. As touching and full of the weight of cautionary tales of blues ballads come before, the album is a reconciliation of those elements that Al Spx has been much quoted as calling Doom Soul. And joy of joys, she’s bringing her grand culmination to our city…
Your dial code suggests you’re in London at the moment, is that right?Yes, I’m in London at the moment; I’m staying here until my visa expires.
You split your time quite frequently now, don’t you?Yeah, I’m gonna be in Toronto in a couple of weeks, after my European tour. I just go back and forth.
Have you gotten used to that nomadic experience?I’ve sort of had to get used to it because of all the touring that I’ve been doing over the last year – it’s been hectic.
It’s good writing material, I guess though, being immersed in all these different cultures, or has it been airports that you’ve been solely exposed to?You’d think it would be, but I haven’t really had any time to do anything; I haven’t been able to– I can’t remember the last time I wrote a song. It’s just airports in and out of towns; play a show, pack up, move on to the next one.
So it was Jim Anderson that drew you to London initially – do you remember the night you arrived?Yeah, it was April 12th 2010; I flew in and got in to Gatwick. I remember taking a cab to my aunt’s house in West London and I think I just slept!
Was it a bright new world when you woke up, or was it still daunting?Well the cab ride was really terrifying, because I realised very quickly that I was on the edge of the horizon to a very large city, but it was fine!
We’ve really adopted you in this country, I think from the moment we saw you on Jools Holland we were sold. Were you aware, before you went on that show, the momentum it could have on your musical career?No, I’m not from here originally, so I wasn’t aware of the effect it could have. Before we even played, we hadn’t even mastered the album, we’d only played two or three shows and it was all very new. As you can tell from the video, I’m absolutely terrified! There’s a lot of twiddling of the thumbs and a couple of visible shakes!
It must be quite daunting though, because the show is renowned for putting emerging acts right next to some of the most established names in the industry, on the same platform…Yeah, I’d heard of people playing in the middle of the stage before, who weren’t really well known and I remember seeing Bon Iver’s video where he played in the same spot, which was fantastic.
I’ve been identifying strongly with the tone of your album, probably because I’m a big soul baby at heart, and I feel great warmth towards gospel music, more towards the commercial end of the spectrum. You took great influence from the American South, but now you’ve had the chance to travel to those areas, have you been able to immerse yourself in that musical heritage? Erm, as much as I could… I did a tour in May, a 35-day tour on a bus with a band from Toronto called Great Lake Swimmers. We covered a lot of the South and spent a lot of time in Texas and met a lot of interesting characters. We also made a point to go to record stores and pick up some stuff. The Deep Allum part of Dallas is really interesting; they’ve got – I don’t know how to describe them, but they have interesting stuff written on the walls – not plaques, but stuff written about blues legends and all the walls are covered in descriptions on how these people came to be. There were a lot of interesting characters that might have, I dunno, stolen my heart as well.
I imagine that you were bequeathed some of your musical passion or influence from your parents, but a career in music wasn’t the easiest thing for them to stomach, was it?No, I mean they’re fine now, but it’s been exaggerated a bit and that’s my own fault for just rambling, haha. They’re just like any other parents; when their kid tells them they’ve dropped out of school and moved away to a different country and I’m not coming back ‘til my album’s finished, they’re going to be naturally a bit freaked out! But it’s all good, they’re really supportive now and I just say that initially, they just wanted the best for me and in the beginning they didn’t think what I was doing was the best and they were freaked out. They just had a lot of expectations for me, and dropping out of university and moving to a different country was not one that they expected!
You mentioned Great Lake Swimmers, but there are a wealth of Canadian bands that I really love, and all very different; Metric and Broken Social Scene for that, Feist, Grimes, hip hop artists like K-Os… Is it a very nurturing scene in Canada, or are there success stories come out of something quite disparate?I think in Canada, not many people expect to make a career out of music. The music industry isn’t very big there; it’s a very big country, but the population is only something like 40 million people, so no one really expects to make a career out of it. People are just very creative and, I guess, not afraid to be different because they don’t expect anyone to sign them so I find that musicians in Toronto just go for it creatively.
One of the other aspects of music that I read you had an affinity with were the old tradition of field recordings. I’ve listened to loads of live sessions of your music, like the Daytrotter session, and they sound not too distant from the album recording. Did you set out to translate that live sound?I think what happened was that I hadn’t really played that many shows until I recorded the album, so I recorded the album and then figured out how I wanted to sound live and took it from there.
I was reading the write-up on the Daytrotter website actually -- I haven’t even listened to that yet, I should get around to it.
Oh, I love the Daytrotter site – I’m a paid up member and each new session is a real treat to listen to…I remember when I did that, I was in Ashville, North Carolina and someone came and picked me up to take me to the studio, and it was amazing. After, when I walked out, I noticed a music shop across the street and said to the guy, “I see loads of vintage amps over there – what are they like?” He said, “I’m not sure, but I know that Jack White was in there last night and spent a fortune!” So I went in there and just plugged my guitar into a bunch of amps and thought if it’s good enough for Jack White, it’s good enough for me! I found this vintage amp from 1956, a Fender Champ and it doesn’t have any tone dials, just a volume dial. I think it was originally meant for harmonica players. I remember doing the Daytrotter session – sorry, I’m just rambling, haha – but I did the session and then picked that up, so I haven’t actually listened to it.
So I’ve always wondered if Daytrotter just has the one studio that everybody comes to?I think when I was on tour with the Swimmers, they did one in Illinois, and I think that’s where their main studio is, but based on times, they do sessions in North Carolina as well.
And do you have to sit for the portrait they illustrate of you?No, I didn’t know that was going to happen!
Have you seen it?Yes, I thought it was horrifying, haha! They really emphasised my East African forehead!
The write-up was great, but suggested that the tracks were autobiographical, but equally, they come across as folk narratives that anyone can share – ancient themes that run through all of our lives…When I write lyrics, well certainly when I was writing them for this album, I tried to write personal lyrics, but still have them be very vague. So I have my own personal meanings that I don’t really want to share, but by writing it that way, I made it so that people could interpret it in their own way.
I do think it’s an album that you have a very intimate, personal experience with. I keep listening to it on my own, through my headphones and it kind of holds your hand through different emotions.Thanks, I think I agree with that.
You spoke about writing for the new album, but as you said, you also haven’t had much time, so as fans, how long do we have to wait?No, I haven’t, but I started writing it a couple of months ago and so there are a handful of songs that are written for it. But it’s just gone a bit dry inside of my head; I think just ‘cause of time, and being quite busy. I’m not sure… there are a couple of songs that I might do a live EP with, or might do a record some time down the line, so hopefully it won’t be too long!
Lastly, you’re coming to Norwich as part of the line-up for Norwich Sound and Vision’s John Peel Festival of New Music, which I’m really excited about in its entirety. I read that at one stage you couldn’t afford to take the whole band on the road with you, so what’s the situation for this tour?The whole band’s coming! That was the American tour in May; we were an opening band and it was very expensive to do that 35 days in America but we’re in the UK now – we’re all based here so we’re all coming.
Does that mean you had any of Great Lake Swimmers join you on stage to play for you on any of the American dates, or did you go up alone?I went up alone every night! Greg, the drummer, drummed for us for a few shows recently though.
I’m sure you’ll appreciate the company of the band for this tour though – are you looking forward to it?Yeah, very much; I’m very excited to be able to do this again with all of my buddies. Rob Ellis is going to be drumming with us as well –
No way! I can’t tell you how many albums I own that he’s had something to do with…Yeah, so I’m really looking forward to doing it!
Emma Garwood
Cold Specks comes to the Norwich Arts Centre on Friday 12th October, as part of Norwich Sound and Vision, running from 11th-13th Oct. For ticket info go to www.norwichsoundandvision.co.uk. Read the full interview at Outlineonline.co.uk