Hey everyone, Anthony Fantano here, the Internet's busiest music nerd. I hope you are doing well. Today we have a wonderful returning guest to the stream, to the interviews, that would be singer, songwriter extraordinaire, Mount Erie, AKA Phil Elverum, AKA formerly The Microphones, so on and so forth.

Anthony: New album Night Palace is out now. I have been working my way through its density, through its layers. I feel like I'm still kind of getting a little acclimated, but still, I have a lot of questions and a lot of things on my mind given just how self-referential the album is–how sort of like abstractly but also concretely you engage in certain topics and concepts. But before we dig into anything and everything else that will come up in the interview, Phil, I want to thank you for coming through again.

Phil: Thanks for having me. Hello. No problem

Anthony: Alright, well, I guess like off the bat, I'd like to comment on the fact that and just kind of get your thoughts on the creative makeup of this album just being so wildly different from your last major project, which everybody knows was like kind of this one long 40 minute sort of like conceptual narrative song that was looking back on your time as The Microphones. And now this new album is just like so all over the place. Many shorter songs and sort of like vignettes and pieces of poetry set to music playing out over the course of a 90-minute run almost. And not so much retrospective as that Microphone's 2020 record was. Now you sort of like closed the chapter on that. Did this sort of feel like the time to kind of get more in the present and start breaking your songs down into smaller bites and stuff like that?

Phil: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. It's funny when you said that it's really self-referential. I was like, 'Ah, damn it, I tried to do the opposite of that.' But I can admit that. Yeah, there's lots of little nuggets of self-reference in there, but for the most part I thought that with The Microphones in 2020 thing, and then I put out a Microphones box set right after that. I was just like, 'Okay, that's done. Sealed off, move forward, everything is new now. Time to live in the present moment--and the future.' So that's what I was trying to do with Night Palace.

Anthony: Maybe self-referential is the wrong terminology. Maybe more–it feels like you're kind of getting back into the swing of certain things and you're giving us a continuation of certain themes that I think longtime Mount Erie and Microphone fans will be familiar with. Maybe one major one that I feel like we could get into is I feel like on a lot of these tracks, you're really kind of getting back into exploring these ideas in a new stage of your life that have to do with feeling small, feeling like one insignificant speck of dust in this larger universe of things. Just a really great world that kind of makes you feel insignificant in comparison to just the vastness that surrounds you. I feel like you've returned to that in a big way with a certain level of experience now as a father, as a career artist, and also somebody who's been writing about these topics for as long as you have.

Phil: Yeah, yeah, that's true. That's very present. But I don't know if it's ever gone away. Even with the more grounded autobiographical stuff. For the previous albums, I feel like that perspective was going strong, too. Want to know what I think this album is about?

Anthony: No, I do, I do, I do.

Phil: Yeah, I sort of wrote about it in the bio thing that's in the liner notes – and I sent out to people – but I think it's about connection. It's not about solitude or smallness or insignificance or impermanence, although those themes are always there. It's actually about after living in a lot of kind of dramatic change through the past, I don't know, 10 years of my life, being less thrown around by the changes and actually just being living in a place and settling into a quieter kind of interconnectedness with talking to animals, being a parent, being a partner, living in a place in a more intentional and deep way, looking at deeper history of this place. So it's almost like even though I'm always talking about impermanence, it's actually trying to get as much permanence as I can or something. You know what I mean?

Anthony: No, no. I actually see that connection. I feel like there are some points in that observation of connection. There are tracks where you're very much almost mourning a lack thereof on occasion on the record too, like on "Non-Metaphorical Decolonization", it sort of seems like as much as you're kind of like celebrating that ability to not be in solitude, you're sort of feeling disheartened at the ways in the world that you're sort of seeing that it's not there, that it should be there.

Phil: Yeah, that's true. Although I think of "Decolonization", for example, as a type of connection. It's like a reconnecting with reality and the deeper honesty of living on this continent. So to me, "Decolonization"is about healing and reconnection rather than, 'oh, we're also disconnected.'

Anthony: So when you're talking about like, you know, sort of like speaking with this fish, for example, what exactly sort of made you kind of narratively want to build that in such a way to where the fish had like access to some kind of like profound knowledge that you didn't, per se, you know what I mean? It's like it sort of felt like you entered into that in a way where I'm going to tell this fish what's up. And the fish was just like, 'No, actually I'm more aware of sort of things than you are.'

Phil: Yeah. Getting, getting domed by a fish. Yeah. I mean that song grew out of this one line in, I think it was Mountains and Waters Sutra by Dogan. This like old Zen text where the line is like, if you tell a fish or a dragon what you see as a palace is flowing water, they would disagree with you. So it's basically, you know, a direct quote because I say I told a fish, 'What you see as a palace is flowing water', and the fish said, 'No'. And so yeah, it's just like maybe about time scales of permanence, perspective on what's solid and what's not. And then when I read that I was in the mountains actually and I looked out across at these like huge cascading mountain ranges and I was like, 'Oh, all of those supposedly like ancient permanent solid mountains are not solid either. They're just flowing on a different time scale that's sort of beyond me.' And it, I guess that's another example of me enjoying the feeling of being tiny in the big picture. But yeah, that was the seed of that song and just using the fish as like a foil for a source of wisdom, giving a voice. And then I gave it auto tune and 808 drum machine just so it was like from another realm, you know.

Anthony: When you were kind of like pulling that moment together, did you – I'm sure you sort of experiment with a lot of things along these lines when you're kind of pulling tracks together maybe demoing certain things – but at least from like the outsider perspective, did that feel at all like there might be sort of a pre human ideas kind of thing going on here between the electronics and the auto tune? A little bit in terms of like what you've shown us on that side before?

Phil: Definitely, yeah, for sure. I wanted to get it to be as. Because the album is pretty analog. It's pretty like organic.

Anthony: Yeah, for sure.

Phil: I recorded it all, even that song. So I wanted it to be like clearly from another realm. From the synthetic realm. It's actually pretty tricky doing autotune on reel to reel tape. It worked out and I wanted it to sound way more 100 gecs than it ended up turning out. But I'm new at autotune.

Anthony: What exactly is, for the home recording nerds out there, what exactly is the auto tune to tape challenge?

Phil: Like I just had my computer. Yeah, I had the computer set up as if I was recording onto it. But instead of pressing record on the computer, I just went out from the headphones of the computer onto the tape deck. So it's just monitoring through the computer through Logic or whatever with however many auto tunes I could get cranked up.

Anthony: Got it. Understood. You know, it's funny that you mentioned 100 gecs because I do feel like in a way like Pre Human Ideas was one of the first hyper pop contributions without people fully kind of realizing and understanding.

Phil: Yeah, yeah.

Anthony: I mean, it may in fact be the case. And I mean, I feel like there are a lot of indie bands out there that are kind of embracing the auto tune thing, be it Courting, or I mean, there are a handful of other groups out there who are kind of like flirting with it. Just in kind of like a lo fi indie rock context.

Phil: Yeah, I always like it when it's way too much auto tune. I think the more the better. Always. It's been around for so long at this point. It's like, remember when it was controversial? I feel like now it's just part of the palette of music in general. And it's been that way for a while. Yeah, it's just like a sound that's available for everyone to use as an effect.

Anthony: You know, I feel like if there's another kind of defining thing about this album, musically and esthetically, it does feel like you're throwing a bit of caution to the wind in terms of what you feel people, again, esthetically perceive Mount Erie and your music to be. There are tracks– I mean, the experience of the track list is quite jumpy at points. There are tracks where you're embracing more of kind of this drone side and touching down on some of what I know to be kind of your noise and black metal influences. There are other tracks that sort of seem like very kind of straightforward, very harmonious indie rock. It sort of seems like you're touching down on a little bit of everything with this album. Was there no pressure for you personally to sort of stick to one vibe or sound or idea or direction, as maybe you have on past albums?

Phil: Yeah, no, I think until A Crow Looked at Me, I was always into making records that felt dynamic and didn't stick to one kind of palette. I think I always made records – Maybe Pre Human Ideas is pretty much one palette – by the way. I don't consider that an album. That's just like a weird compilation of demos.

Anthony: Oh, no. For sure.

Phil: I've always liked making records that felt not like aggressively incohesive, but more unclear if it's a compilation or if it's all by one artist. I think dynamic change within an album has always been something that appeals to me. And then I sort of experimented for the past few years with choosing a palette and sticking to it. And I was kind of inspired by Arise Therefor the Will Oldham album, which is, I mean, all of his records maybe take that approach of choosing a band and recording the album as that band rather than this schizophrenic roller coaster. But yeah, I don't know, I honestly just had these songs and I recorded them in the way that felt like best suited the song on a song by song basis. And then about halfway through recording the album started to think about how they all gelled and what the sort of glue tying them all together could be.

Anthony: No, I mean, you're kind of right in your characterization of your past records like that. I do sort of personally as a listener, kind of perceive there to be maybe a lot of esthetic cohesion between the songs on albums. Like, It Was Hot or The Glow pt 2. But I think that maybe is mostly there just because I'm so used to listening to those albums for years and years and years at a time. And I kind of just sort of see them all lumped together in that way. Whereas this new album, it sort of seems like you're going back to a similar sense of adventure, but your experiences and your abilities as an artisan, as a producer have kind of expanded to the point where you can do so much more now than you could back at that point. So you're kind of just doing a little bit of everything, but stretching out even further, sprawling out even further. Like your roots have gone out farther at this point. So you're executing more.

Phil: Yeah, maybe. I still have a pretty limited palette of instruments, but I think that the sounds that I'm trying to get to that I hear in my head or whatever, that I'm using these instruments and kind of manipulating them to get the sounds, I think it's a pretty wide range, but I haven't gotten into more gear, actually probably have less gear available than I did in The Microphones albums, because I'm just recording in this room where I am now. And so, yeah, I've got like five things.

Anthony: No, it sort of seems more like, you know, you're sort of executing a wider array of ideas as opposed to bringing in this ocean of instrumentation that we have heard before. I mean, just by point of comparison, "Myths Come True" For example, like kind of the nocturnal dancy grooves and that spoken word inspiration that you have on that track. I can't quite place it, but it feels, like, so familiar. It feels almost like, I don't know, a little "Tom's Diner" in a way, if that's even, like, a weird comparison to make. The way that you're kind of just going through this narrative over these danceable grooves, it just feels so unlike– It's familiar, but also so unlike anything else you've done before in terms of the first half of the track.

Phil: Track, yeah, totally. I've wanted to experiment more with just speaking for a long time, and maybe I just have chickened out. But on this album, and there's a couple of extended speaking parts, I think it's cool. I think I like the idea of pressing a vinyl that is not necessarily music. I mean, there's a long history of spoken sections in pop music, right? But I've never explored that very much.

Anthony: You know, it's sort of weird because I feel like you're singing delivery usually almost kind of flirts with the idea of doing that. You know, it's like it's sung, but there's kind of a gentleness to it where it almost feels like speech or it feels like a conversation. And it's like you finally just broke into that fully in a way, you know?

Phil: Yeah, and it was so hard actually. Recording speaking. The singing parts I didn't take very many takes to get it right, but the spoken parts, I would do them over and over to speak naturally. I guess people who are actors know this. To speak and make it sound human or to read written text and make it sound natural? So hard.

Anthony: Were there any similar hitches that you had when you were recording, like, for example, "Wind & Fog, Pt. 2"? Because there is kind of something about that track that just feels so intense and close and you're really kind of digging into the lower depths of your singing range at that point. And it does, again, kind of border on spoken word a little bit, in a way.

Phil: Totally. Yeah. That song was written an octave higher. I can't actually sing that low usually, but I was really sick. And so the morning I had recorded the backing music for it already, and I was gonna sing it, and I just had this throat sickness of some kind, and my voice was so low, and I just recorded it first thing in the morning, and I could hit those low notes, and it reminded me of late period Leonard Cohen, who is the best. My favorite era of him, his voice just got lower and more subharmonic. So I love that. Like, too close and too low, where it will blow out your speakers.

Anthony: No, it's fucked up that, you know, obviously when you're sick, you're not feeling very well, but simultaneously you do get that lower range, and then it's ripped from you when you feel better.

Phil: Yeah. And also when I was a teenager, I remember always trying to record when I was sick because I liked that, like, stuffy, kind of, like, pathetic sound, pathetic vocal sound. Maybe it was more like 90s indie rock or whatever. It's like home recording guys were like, 'why did you leave me?' I used to record as much as possible when I was stuffed up.

Anthony: Okay. A couple of questions kind of bubbling up in my head, maybe the first of which that I want to ask you, in regards to the creation of these tracks in a broader sense is, in the songwriting proces, I don't know, with the way I'm hearing these tracks and reading them, I'm getting the sense that maybe some of them, maybe on some level started out as poems and you're just kind of setting music to poems that you've written. Because some of the tracks, you know, sort of seem like they're being led by the statements that you're making and they're based on such a short piece of poetry and they're almost here and gone before you even have a sense of what you're hearing. But when you pay attention to every word that you're saying, it really hits. Was that in fact, is that in fact the case? Like, did you sort of have a series of words in your head? You're like, 'I just need to set music to this?'

Phil: Pretty much, yeah. That's pretty much how they all went. They were all ideas written in the notebook, not word for word how they ended up in the recording. But it's all about the poem that is being delivered. And I sat down and sort of converted the poem into a song, but I didn't change the words much. I sort of bent the music to fit the words. For example, the song "I Heard Whales", I think it has this big, like, noise section in the middle because that in the poem version or whatever in the notebook, I just wrote that whole two minute white noise interlude as like parentheses because I didn't know how to convey that feeling. It was almost like an imagined sound. So in the recording I had to manifest that imagined sound, which I tried to do with the sound collage. But yeah, that the songs are– I don't know, what's a song, what's a poem. There's crossover.

Anthony: No, there's definitely crossover. And that part that you cite to me, sort of like hit is one of the most cinematic parts of the record because you're trying to manifest whatever the experience is in your words into sound. And it sort of describes sonically exactly what you're talking about. Like, you're hearing something and I suppose if there were a clear statement going on, you would have created some sound that sounded exactly like a whale or maybe literally sampled the whale and threw it in there. But as you're kind of listening to the wall of sound, you feel like there are things that you can make out in it. There are things that maybe you can't. There's like a bit of a sort of a question there. There's something to wonder about.

Phil: That's exactly what I was trying to do, was make something– Have you ever seen this? Maybe it's a meme. It's like an image where it looks like a still life of, you know, somebody's room, and the caption is like, name one thing in this photo.

Anthony: Yeah, yes, I've seen that. Yeah, a couple of them.

Phil: Yeah, I was trying to do the audio equivalent of that, where it definitely had a feeling, but name one thing in this collage. You can't really.

Anthony: Right. Yeah. No, the entire picture looks like something that you should be able to make out at sort of like a quick glance, but then looking at it more specifically, you can't. Yeah, exactly like what you said. And I'm glad that you just put all that into words because that actually brings me to the next thing I was wondering about, because there's a pretty bold statement that you also make in the lyrics on this record, a meta comment on music itself, where you say recorded music is a statue of a waterfall, which I thought --

Phil: I stand by that.

Anthony: No, no, for sure. I mean, I think it's an apt statement, and an accurate one. But maybe one that people would read as a little confusing for somebody who's dedicated his life to recording music. You know what I mean? While that's true, maybe by some, it could be read as almost like kind of a dismissive observation or sort of like speaking to sort of a shortcoming of the medium of the art form.

Phil: Yeah, it is. It is speaking to the shortcoming of it, but in a funny way. Obviously, I love recorded music, but. Sorry, were you still talking?

Anthony: Oh, no, no, no. Go on. You know, I just. I just would love to know sort of more for you where that sort of feeling comes from.

Phil: Yeah, it was just me trying to talk about the shortcoming of this practice of mine of recording music. Capturing something that is moving and changing and fleeting. Songs are always changing. Each time they're performed, they get remanifested in a fresh way that's cool and beautiful and that's what life is like. Everything's always changing. So to seal something up is almost like a pale shadow of its actual self, in a way. I was doing a diss on recorded music, even though I love recorded music and that's what I do with my life.

Anthony: Okay, exploring that, do you feel like there are elements of that process that, through your experience, get easier over time? Or do you think there are aspects of experiences and senses in real life that are better or more intensely captured in art than they are? Just by living in it, existing in it, and experiencing it?

Phil: For sure, yeah. I mean, live music also sucks.

Anthony: Hot. Hot takes in this interview, man. Hot takes in this interview.

Phil: Both recorded and live music sucks heavily.

Anthony: Haha, okay.

Phil: No, yeah, it's that for sure. I think there's things you can get to with recorded music that are like its own thing. It's like its own kind of special realm. Like, a statue of a waterfall is not a bad thing. It's a cool thing. You can make an amazing statue of a waterfall, but it's still, like, a little bit absurd. And it can be very beautiful, but it's not a waterfall. It's. It's a weird echo of the thing.

Anthony: Yeah. And also, I feel it's a great point of comparison to pull up there because, I mean, part of the beauty of a waterfall is its movement. You're seeing it move, you know, it's not the same thing as a statue of, I don't know, a tree. Whereas, you know, you're not necessarily sort of observing it or eating it up for some action it's performing in any given moment. Whereas again, a waterfall is about flow.

Phil: Yeah. And then the next line is about taxidermied marlin, which is kind of basically like a waterfall in fish form.

Anthony: No, absolutely. There's a lot of content, especially in the second half of this record also, that sort of seems to dive into ownership and consumption a little bit. I feel like this is almost kind of an unignorable negative part of our reality, especially for an artist such as yourself, because a lot of what you deal in much of the time does directly have to do with nature in the natural world. And it sort of seems like we're living in times where that's more in danger than ever. And I don't know, at least from my perspective, it sort of seems like that's coming out in your music a bit more because that's often something that you celebrate in your work. I mean, was that sort of a conscious decision that you were making going into this album?

Phil: Yeah, yeah. Maybe not going into it, but as I worked on it for a couple of years, somewhere in there, I just was getting more and more riled up about these things. Like people being so uptight and weird about private property and ownership. Me owning land and feeling weird about it. Like the song "Co-Owner of Trees" it's a self own kind of. And then, yeah, the "Decolonization" part is maybe wanting to sort of tie all of my more metaphorical and mystical nature personal like relationship with the natural world stuff to tie it to reality because I also live in reality and so wanting to just avoid being lost in mysticism or something that's just picturesque.

Anthony: Is this something that you feel like you are maintaining a connection to an observation of as you get older and go further into your career? Because at least how I read another track kind of around the midpoint of the record, "I Saw Another Bird", it sort of seemed like in that way you were kind of writing a song about birds and, and whatever that may represent for you in the track, trying to connect and kind of have a conversation with you. But the protagonist of the song is almost sitting there oblivious in a way not really paying attention. And I'm sort of wondering if that's out of some kind of like disassociation or ignorance or is that something that you're kind of letting go of and you're not allowing something to phase you in a way? It could be kind of either, I suppose.

Phil: Yeah, no, it was, it's me, but it's also not just me. I was sort of like the me or the like narrator in that song is a stand-in for, all people and how all of us are either kind of aware of the world, and the non-human world around us, or not aware. And we just fluctuate on that awareness at all times. And so for me it was like living here on the ground and there's like birds squawking at me and sometimes I'm not. And the bird also is a stand-in for not just birds, but the whole non-human world, everything beyond us. And so it's sort of using these really specific symbols to signify these bigger things. And the song is about awareness and attaching significance or accepting that significance is there. Yeah, once I start talking about what these songs are about, I can just ramble. But anyways, it's about how all of us are ignorant at times of what's going on around us.

Anthony: One thing I'd like to kind of posit about the record, that I'm kind of curious as to whether or not you would assess it in this way – And maybe this is something that I feel like I'm only reading due to how long I've been listening to your music and following your artistic trajectory – But do you feel like you're kind of embracing a certain sort of joy and positivity on this record? I feel like there is kind of a sense of wonder that has reentered the fold on this album that's really palpable and kind of intense at points.

Phil: Yeah, that's cool. I'm glad to hear that, because I do. I am happy. That's good. Yeah. I went through a lot of years of people when I'd, like, say, 'Hey, I'm playing a show in Philadelphia', comments would be like, 'I'm gonna go and cry my brains out. Who wants to go cry and be depressed with me?' And that sucks. I mean, it's understandable. But I didn't enjoy being that only to people, so I'm glad. Yeah, I know I have maybe a little bit of a dour demeanor at times, but I don't think so. I think I'm sort of a goofy and I am happy in my life. And there is more wonder and release, I think.

Anthony: Yeah. I mean, in retrospect, obviously there were a handful of years there where in your art, you were very, very, very open about various things that you were kind of going through, some of the darkest moments of your life. Are there any feelings or considerations on the way as you were just kind of saying the way people started or began to perceive you based on that? Because also, those records did seem to sort of draw a lot of attention to you. It created a bit of a flux. It sort of seemed like it brought in some listeners who weren't necessarily having heard everything that you've done up until that point. And those records kind of became their context for you, in a way.

Phil: Yeah, no, it's all good. I mean, it's amazing what happened with those records, and I'm so grateful for it and the people that connected with it and continue to. Actually, I still hear from people that are finding those things and don't know about my other music, and I love that, but I don't know, I'm a full spectrum person. And also, even back then, even in Like A Crow Looked At Me or whatever, I don't think of that album as being about sorrow, depression, death, just grief, just loss, I feel like I tried to fill it with love. And even at the time I talked about it like that, and when I was singing those songs and playing those shows, that's what I felt. I felt like love for this person who had died, but still love. And I'm raising this kid who, her mom died, and whenever we talk about her, it's about the love. It's not about the loss and about how much it sucks that she died. It's about, we loved her, she loved us. That's what I want to resonate with the music and with just me as a person. So, I think that carries through to this new album, Night Palace, and me talking to a bird and attaching significance to maybe hearing whales, maybe it was not, and that feeling of like, is there a ghost haunting me right now? And if so, it's a benevolent ghost, it's not like a menacing bad thing. If there's a spirit world or something, I feel it as support, and love, and positivity.

Anthony: No, there is a lot of love on the record. I mean, "My Canopy" sort of seems like very short and sweet. Just a very bold statement of love if you just kind of look right at the lyrics of that. And also, I mean, tracks like "Swallowed Alive" just sort of seem like you're doing them out of pure fun. I mean, if I'm to read that correctly. I mean, that's your daughter on the track, I'm presuming?

Phil: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, that's her.

Anthony: So, yeah, for anybody who's unfamiliar, there's these giant crashes of distortion and riffs and drums, and it sort of sounds like you're kind of doing the most lo fi metal thing ever. And then all of a sudden, her vocals come in at the very end. I mean, was that a collaborative idea as to what you guys came up with?

Phil: Kind of. I recorded the drums, just improvised, and I recorded her separately without listening to the drums just screaming. That's her screaming, too.

Anthony: Oh, really?

Phil: But I did pitch shift her voice down so it sounded more guttural. But, yeah, I applied her screaming and speaking to the track, like in a collage way. I found the right moments to put it there. She didn't do it live.

Anthony: Got it, Got it.

Phil: Yeah, it's just fun. It was like to do a blast of catharsis.

Anthony: Not to dig back into this idea that you say the album is not about the self-referential and meta stuff because obviously it's not. There are a lot of familiar themes, in the spirit of that, I wanted to maybe get some quick thoughts on you returning to this idea of "the Gleam, Pt. 3" toward the end of the album. Because obviously a lot of longtime fans of your work are going to pick up on that immediately. And what do you feel about the writing process of this album and this point in your life and what you wanted to say on this record drew a parallel to what you were saying on that track originally and kind of made you want to extend it in this new way.

Phil: Yeah, I mean, that one is for sure self-referential. It's a straight-up sequel. The first one, I mean "the Gleam, Pt. 2", I have always thought it's a song about my grandma, my maternal grandmother who at the time like 23 years ago or whatever was experiencing early dementia and her mind, her memories were starting to go and we were pretty close and so it might not be obvious in the lyrics of that song, but that's who I was thinking about. Maybe I had a dream about her where she was talking to me. Anyways, I've seen the billowy black, I've been blinded by the gleam. She's the character in that song. And now all these years have passed and my mom is a little bit, she's got memory stuff starting to happen and now I'm like 'Oh, me too'. My lapses in memory, is that what this is starting to ramp up? Am I in line for this? So it's about impermanence once again and just that kind of lineage, that thread that goes through a family and through these songs too.

Anthony: Earlier on in the interview we were talking about connection and the connections that have like inspired this album. And I'm wondering as you kind of have moved out of this dark patch in your life and you're sort of growing as a father and as a partner and also you're referencing contexts in which – I'm still kind of digging into the record – but referencing context in which like you're around other parents too. Do you feel like this new phase of your life is also leading you into situations where you're making new connections with total strangers who are just leading somewhat similar lives as you are? And are those connections meaningful to you or do you feel like you're just kind of engaging in them in passing?

Phil: Yeah, there's a line in"the Gleam, Pt. 3" where I say hi to the faces of the other parents. I will forget who they are. But for now, I know. That sounds pretty dismissive. It sounds like, I don't care about these assholes.

Anthony: I mean, it did stand out for a reason. It didn't seem mean-spirited, but it sort of seemed like you were creating a bit of a separation, a definition between. These are the things, the connections, and the things in my life that are impacting me on this deep level. But simultaneously I'm yearning for it in some places and in other pockets and in other spots of my life. I'm seeing these opportunities pass by where there's no engagement or so surface level or it's almost meaningless in a way.

Phil: Yeah, totally. Yeah. I mean, maybe that's part of the experience of parenthood where you stop hanging out as much with your friends that you had before you had kids and you stop staying up late and then the only other adults you see are like the other parents at the playground or at the school drop off or library or whatever. And you have these more shallow kid-based relationships where you're like, 'So what you've been working on lately, anything good?" I think a lot of people can relate to that. That's part of my life. I actually am fine with it because I do kind of think wistfully of my early 20s living in Olympia, where me and my friends were all creative and collaborative. And now I don't really have that community of friends. And I think I'm fine with it. Yeah, I think I'm kind of creatively thriving in solitude actually. Weirdly, I don't know if I've got something wrong in my mind, but I don't seem to need as much community as others or as I used to.

Anthony: I don't know. I mean, there's all these think pieces about the pandemic of male loneliness. And I was just sort of listening to your record, I'm not saying it sort of sounded like a profoundly sad, lonely experience, but there were parts where it sort of seemed like you were reflecting on the way your life has shifted since you were younger and sort of like the place that you find yourself in as somebody who is raising a child and is kind of growing into their career. And I was just sort of thinking like, I wonder if he's feeling like this kind of isolation or if he's off in his own place or something.

Phil: No, I don't feel loneliness like ever actually. I love solitude. I love being alone to the point where it feels like, is something wrong with me? Like, why don't I get lonely? Maybe it's because my life is full. I have like a partner and a kid and these obligations that keep me– like I gotta go to, to town twice a day to pick her up from school and stuff, so I am not like a total hermit. So that the windows I do have of alone time where my mind can stretch out. I just cherish them. It never crosses into loneliness. I don't know, I should try getting lonely sometime, see if I can pull it off.

Anthony: Have these new life balances that you found yourself in the midst of, with your obligations as a parent and anything else that I may not be considering right now, have these at all kind of presented themselves in recent years to be challenges as you are continuing to balance a music career and make albums that are as dense and as long as this one? Frankly, I feel like there's a lot of people would probably be impressed with the fact that you got as much material done as you did on this album. That was all interesting and worth sharing.

Phil: Thanks. Yeah, it's definitely challenging. Touring is the hardest part because I've got this nine year old kid and does she come. It's not a great atmosphere, a rock and roll tour for a nine year old kid who doesn't really want to be there. I could bring her along when she was younger and just have like a nanny come along, but that part I haven't figured out how to do that yet. But recording, I don't know. I think I've just developed the habit, the work habit where when she's at school I can go get right into it, start my work so I just can work in the windows of time that I have and let go of it on the times that I don't have.

Anthony: And you know, also as an artist who's been doing what he does as long as you have, I mean, does anything sort of phase you in terms of what you see out there on the current day music and media landscape in terms of how you get and sort of share and disseminate your art these days? I mean, obviously I'm sure on some level you're aware of TikTok and new waves of viral things on social media. You tweeted about your daughter being aware of the frickin "Skibidi Toilet". So you're aware on some level that there are other pipes and channels through which people are sort of finding out about art and music that were vastly different than what they were when you were originally dropping albums on K Records decades ago. What do you attribute at this point? Because people still obviously consume and discuss your work in big music nerd circles. Is there anything you're doing specifically in terms of making sure people are still connecting with the work or do you feel like it's still kind of spreading organically in a way?

Phil: Yeah, good question. I don't know. There have been times where I'm like, 'Okay, I gotta really look into this TikTok thing and figure out how to work that.' Just recently I made some Instagram posts for the first time thinking, yeah, it's with this album cycle actually I thought, I love this album, I'm really proud of it and I want to do it up. I don't want to retreat into my crusty punk, idealistic, like opting out of everything way. And I put it on the streaming services even though I'm like really anti those. I just wanted to, maybe I wanted to like get a Grammy. Okay, I wanted– not really, but I just wanted to like participate all the way. I wanted to be not siloed off in my own great community of people that are tuned into what I'm doing, follow my substack or whatever and they know what I'm doing. That can be isolating too.

Anthony: Right.

Phil: So I'm into just like making myself available and I don't totally understand the new landscape and I'm not really trying to understand it all the way. I'm 46 and it's a little embarrassing to be like middle-aged guy who's starting a TikTok account to be like, hey, dance along to this "Decolonization" song, will you? Yeah, I guess I'm trying to strike a balance and do things in the way that feels close enough to my values. And so that means Substack and occasional Instagram post. Ugh, I hate it though.

Anthony: No, I think it's a good move. I would let TikTok die out. And then when you're pushing 60, then jump onto whatever the new thing is then. And then you'll be a novelty to all the 14 year olds on though, because like, 'Whoa, who's this like 60 year old guy?' You know you'll bea novelty.

Phil: My hope is that the 14 year olds, when I'm 60, the 14 year olds will be like, fuck smartphones and social media. We just started doing we want, we're opting out of all of it.

Anthony: We want to do a DIY show.

Phil: Yeah, I mean, maybe that's backwards looking, but I read a little blurb the other day about like 'Meet the new teenagers in Manhattan who aren't doing social media or anything.' And they all seem like cool, weird kids, so maybe it's possible.

Anthony: Fingers crossed. Phil, I appreciate you coming through and being an open book and telling us everything about the album. Really kind of digging into the songs and you know, again, thank you.

Phil: Yeah, thanks for having me. Talk to you later.

Anthony: Talk to you later. Have a good rest of your day. Bye, man.