A Q&A Session With Anders Parker
Conducted via e-mail by Brian Briscoe
BB: I love Tell It to the Dust; you just never disappoint. It's been so long since Songs in a Northern Key—why?
AP: Well, I got caught in the record company machine. To make a very long story short, I was ready to record this record in 2002, but it kept being put off. By mid 2003 I had reached my breaking point, so I asked off the label (Artemis/E-Squared) and they graciously let me go and gave me a bit of severance pay which allowed me to start the record myself. From there I was recording whenever I could, as schedules and funds allowed. Not an ideal situation, but a few great folks stepped up and lent money and studio time. The record was completed in April of 2004 and I hooked up with Baryon shortly after that.
BB: The press kit says you recorded 22 songs (12 appear on the new CD). Will the other songs be released?
AP: Yes. There's a six song EP coming out early next year called The Wounded Astronaut. They are all different songs from the record. The rest of the songs I didn't have the time to finish. Incidentally, it was originally going to be a double record, but like I said, I couldn't finish them all and I wanted the record to come out this year. It'd been too long and I was getting antsy.
BB: "Feel the Same" and "Don't Worry Honey, Everything's Gonna Be Alright" are so beautiful and optimistic. What inspired those songs?
AP: Both of those songs just appeared. I wrote them both in about the time it takes to play them. Just poured out. So, I wouldn't say that I consciously tried to write optimistic songs, but I guess I wanted to have a little sun on the record, to poke through some of the clouds.
BB: So is the Varnaline moniker no more?
AP: Varnaline is no more. After the last record I just felt like it was time for a change and I was doing a lot of solo shows so it just made sense. Varnaline was supposed to be a band, and for a while it was, but it was just too hard to maintain it.
BB: Once upon a time I interviewed you over the phone for Pop Culture Press. I didn't feel like I did a good job; hey, I was nervous. But you said back then that on the eponymous Varnaline CD you guys were "trying to be a rock band." Did you make a conscious decision to go in a new direction on the three CDs since then?
AP: Well, for the second record we had been on the road quite a bit before we recorded it and I had written all these songs for the rock band that we were then. We were just full-out on the tours before and after that record. I think we kinda surprised a lot of people 'cause Man of Sin was so low-fi and intimate and we would come on with guns blazing. Anyway, after that I wrote Sweet Life which I envisioned as a kind of pastoral pop record. And then Songs in a Northern Key, which was totally outside of any band type consideration and might as well have been recorded in a cave. I think some of it was, actually.
BB: Every time you come through the Dallas/Ft. Worth area the local papers call your music "alt country," which confounds me to no end.
AP: Yeah, me too. Weird how those things happen and stick. I saw a copy of No Depression the other day and thought, "I have very little to do with any of this." Not that I have anything against No Depression, 'cause I don't. I think it's a cool magazine and they've been very nice to me. I guess the one common denominator is the importance of the song. If push came to shove I'd say "singer/songwriter". Pretty vague, but that's fine with me.
BB: How did "Doornail (Hat's Off to Buster Keaton)" come about? It's bluesier than anything else you've done, isn't it?
AP: Yeah, that song came out of a weird guitar tuning that I use. It's got this really heavy, sustained vibe to it. It just makes me want to write heavy songs!
I was watching a lot of Buster Keaton movies at the time and I kind of equated the way his characters narrowly avoid serious harm and tragedy in an unaware fashion to the plight of mankind. The old bending-over-to-pick-up-something-you-dropped-and-narrowly-avoiding-being-hit-by-the-wrecking-ball type of vibe.
BB: Do you prefer the studio or stage? Are you touring?
AP: They are very different. Like them both, but looking forward to touring, which I will be doing this November (mid-west) and December (east coast and some mid-west).
BB: Anything you'd like to add?
AP: You can check out my website here. It'll have all of the news on shows and upcoming releases. See you down the road.
