David Bazan: ‘I Was Definitely a Drunk’ in 2004
I got to chat with David Bazan a little while back for a spread that appears in the latest issue of Ghettoblaster Magazine, which hits shelves this Friday.
And here are some excerpts from the interview, where Bazan talks about the difference between Pedro the Lion and his solo stuff, being a drunk, getting paid for Cornerstone and making family members cry.
Every time I talk to Bazan (just like the interview from 2006), I’m reminded that he’s just so incredibly disarming, humble and brutally honest. It’s always refreshing and encouraging.
So after you read this, be sure to pick up Ghettoblaster issue 22!
On making his mother cry with his music:
The song When We Fell, which makes a pretty direct reference to my mom — as soon as I finished writing the song, I made an mp3 of it and sent it to [my parents]. Not to get their permissions, per-se, but just to get their reaction. You know, because if this was a problem, I don’t want to play it and I don’t want to use it. Even though I felt strongly about the song. It conveyed something that was pretty important to me, but not so important that I would allow harm to be done to my relationship with my folks.
They heard it and they were definitely vexed by the song on some level. But my mom said ‘It’s your music, and this is a good song. You should play this song, because it’s yours.’ But whenever I play it live, if she’s there, she basically just starts sobbing.
On playing Cornerstone 2009:
I was definitely offered the chance to play Cornerstone last year, and maybe the year before – but I turned down any offers to play there. In hindsight, I was just really confused as to where I stood in terms of what I believed. The pendulum was swinging way out there toward – not quite atheism – maybe a hard agnosticism. Now, I don’t know where it’s really hanging, but I definitely am not as defensive about the fact that I have no idea what I think. I’m just a lot more at ease with that identity, or lack thereof.
It was just an easier decision this year. Because they offered me $3,000 for me to come and play, which is basically a month’s budget for my family. And that’s kind of a big deal. But also because I was a lot more at ease interacting with evangelical Christians. I was just less at ease with myself before; just not as comfortable in my own skin at the time. So it was kind of a no-brainer. I’ll make a little bit of money and play my songs for people.
On having a second child:
I feel like our situation now is just a little more organized than in 2004 when our daughter was born. I was definitely a drunk then and was pretty irresponsible when it came to domestic duties. So I think that made the transition pretty difficult on my wife. She went from being childless to having kids. And now things are much more fully functional. It’s easier to keep the house clean, bills get paid on time, I’m not just drunk all the time. You know, little improvements like that.
On walking the line between candor and ambiguity for Curse Your Branches:
I think that I was about as direct as I could be, but that what you’re picking up is the fact that even my most direct statements about things do come off as nebulous because I’m undecided or… still exploring some different possibilities religiously.
It definitely is [more autobiographical]. Whereas Pedro was more like five percent autobiographical and the EP was like 50 percent auto biographical, this record is definitely 90 percent autobiographical. Which is interesting to me because I didn’t set out to do that. But it did happen that way.
There was a moment where I heavily second-guessed myself; primarily the autobiographical nature of the songs. I just thought, “Man this is not what I want to be doing. Why do I keep writing about religion, and why am I doing it in such a conventional way?” I really kind of panicked for a second. But I happened to be on tour at the moment. And as I would continue to have the desire to play the new songs and feel the deep connection I had with the songs as I did it… I couldn’t deny the fact that regardless of the fact that I didn’t like the category of song they were, I still liked the songs that they were.
It took a little bit of getting used to, but by the end I couldn’t deny that I just really enjoyed playing the songs. They resonate with me even more than some of the older songs, which I still really like. .
On writing concept albums for Pedro the Lion:
There were moments in Pedro the Lion where the songwriting was a little more contrived than I would’ve liked it to be in hindsight. There were certain little moments where maybe I would go with a concept and not what would naturally come out.
With Achilles Heel, I made a concerted effort to not have it be contrived or have any kind of pretense going into the songwriting, and then the same thing with the Headphones and the EP. And now with this new record, it’s sort of just a habit to write what comes out.
In hindsight, [Curse Your Branches] is thematically pretty tight. All of the songs are about the same couple of things. That was completely accidental or unintentional. It was just what my subconscious was doing; it was putting everything in that light.
On the songwriting process for Harmless Sparks — centering on the following lines: “They might have burned, But the priests were out taking turns, Showing nuns what they had discerned about their bodies, In the dark… Instead of breaking little boys hearts” – which is quintessential David Bazan:
Harmless Sparks started as a melody and a guitar part, and those lyrics just kind of popped out. By the end of my first sit-down with that song, the whole first verse was pretty much done. Then I revised it slightly, and it basically stayed like that. It was just the first verse, all the way through “breaking little boys hearts.” It was that way for six months or a year. I just couldn’t come up with anything to follow that, what I think of as a punch line to a joke. There was something so satisfying to me about that. It was tough to come up with lyrics, and I finally had a little bit of a breakthrough.
So you have this story, but what it goes into in the chorus is very much a direct reference to my own situation and my family… sort of my questioning my birthright with my faith and generations before me. Then there’s the fact that my wife does believe and I generally don’t.
Curse Your Branches is out Sept. 1 from Barsuk.
9 Responses to “David Bazan: ‘I Was Definitely a Drunk’ in 2004”
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On 08/19/09 3:00 PM, ryan. said:
what a champ.
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On 08/19/09 3:21 PM, Jay DiNitto said:
Gaseous.
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On 08/19/09 4:44 PM, Sergio Hernandez said:
Really solid stuff, Sean.
Will be picking this up for sure.
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On 08/19/09 5:37 PM, Danny said:
Six “definitely”s.
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On 08/20/09 2:19 PM, Sean Cannon said:
there were plenty more definitelys in the actual interview.
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On 08/21/09 3:02 AM, Entertainment Guru » The Chum Bucket: Miles Davis NES-ified + More said:
[...] David Bazan, former Pedro the Lion frontman, talks about his younger, drunker days. [Buzzgrinder] [...]
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On 08/31/09 4:07 PM, Curse Your Branches at The Library Basement said:
[...] Your Branches is “thematically pretty tight,” as Bazan puts it. It is a statement of the finality of his journey from Christianity to agnosticism. Every song [...]
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On 09/15/09 8:02 AM, Morning Buzz: Kanye West, Foxy Shazam, Violent Femmes, David Bazan | BUZZGRINDER said:
[...] :: My man Dan Harris interviewed David Bazan for ABC’s Amplified. Just as honest as always, like when we talked to him. [...]
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On 09/6/10 3:00 AM, Curse Your Branches | The Library Basement said:
[...] recordings are well-produced with a full band. Curse Your Branches is "thematically pretty tight," as Bazan puts it. It is a statement of the finality of his journey from Christianity to agnosticism. Every song [...]
