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I get a little bit upset about being admonished for betraying bluegrass, which is something I used as a tool. It's never been what I'm working on. I used it to work on what I was doing.
-Chris Thile |
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By Danny Clinch
You hear it on Why Should The Fire Die? and last year's adventurous solo albums from Sean Watkins and Thile, whose stellar Deceiver lived in my CD player for a few weeks after discovering its prickly, dynamic charms. The trio sets down roots, not in the traditional folk music sense, but in the organic one. It's not about how high the new single charts; it's about building a lifetime of creative vibrancy. My thumbnail impression of Thile from February taps into this, and keep in mind, this was a first impression:
Chris Thile by Erin Spurling |
Thile is simply one of the most hot shit instrumentalists I've ever encountered. Mandolin in hand, he resonates the same grand feeling that greats like Charles Mingus or Tim O'Brien exude - men who were born to do just what they are doing, an inspired facility for music that feels as natural as walking or breathing does to the rest of us.
Part of what's so compelling about him is how he seems utterly unfazed by success. Thile states, "It's nice to have people hear our stuff, and that's all I think about when I realize how many records we've sold. It's a blessing to have an audience for your experimentation. In the creative process, it shouldn't have that much effect, if any. In the back of your mind, you're thinking, 'I hope we keep the people we have,' but you can't alter what you're writing for that and nor should you, of course, alter the way you live and treat people. And so, I want any friend that I have to let me know if I'm ever pulling some diva bullshit or anything like that. Somebody needs to let me know!"
He's also wary of buying into impressions given to him by others. In our discussion of The Strokes - a band both of us had initially dismissed, preferring to listen to their inspirations rather than a diluted copy - Thile sang one of their songs for me and afterwards dissected what was really going on. I got him to elaborate on the topic, "I feel like those guys have this incredible bonehead lyric impressionism going on, and it's superimposed over some very intelligent counterpoint - from guitar part to guitar part and how it relates to the bass part and the drum lines. It's all very disparate, and it forms a safety net under his wild, drunken vocals. That's exciting, and it's kind of a balance to me - the devil-may-care in his voice and then very intricate parts underneath him."
Mike Marshall & Chris Thile |
Besides his day job with Nickel Creek, Thile has cranked out four solo albums and a duo record with fellow mandolinist Mike Marshall. He's already in the planning stages for a new solo project. "I've got it all worked out. I'm gonna use four other musicians that are all around my age and who I feel are just absolute monsters. It's gonna be mandolin, fiddle, guitar, banjo, and bass. These kids are just amazing. Compositionally, I've made some leaps in the last couple months that I hope to represent. The exciting thing about it is we're all too young, naïve, and idealistic to realize we can't make Kind of Blue."
The four "monsters" are Greg Garrison (Leftover Salmon) on bass, Gabe Witcher (top session fiddle player in L.A. right now), banjoist Noam Pikelny (Leftover Salmon, John Cowan Band), and guitarist Chris Eldridge (son of the Seldom Scene's Ben Eldridge). They're high-powered company, but that's not something Thile shies away from.
If there's one composer that ignites Thile's imagination it is J.S. Bach. Asking about this classical giant is one of the few times he falters. "I can't even talk about it because I'll just cry. I put it on and will sit reverently in front of it for however long I can before the world drags me back. I'll play it, and I'll even naïvely attempt to imitate him compositionally or at least try to pick up some of the intent. He was such an intent-ful composer. A greater artist cannot be found in the history of the world."
Nickel Creek |
This musical reaching backwards extended to the equipment used to make their new record. Working with ace Los Angeles producers Tony Berg (Beck, Michael Penn, Squeeze) and Eric Valentine (Smash Mouth, Dwarves, Third Eye Blind), they employed a mighty arsenal of creaky contraptions.
"At the center of our little gear trip was a John Stevens 24-track tape recorder, a just awesome machine. You expect to get that beautiful, soft, warm, fuzzy bass from analog, but this tape machine had a beautiful clarity to the top end. It was really nice, the best of both worlds," states Thile. "And then, Telefunken 251s played heavily into the mic'ing of the record. That mic, it's always upsetting when what's most expensive turns out to be the best (laughs). For 'Why Should The Fire Die?' we used one stereo C24, just huddled around that. Eric had all these awesome tape reverbs that are all over it. That spooky fiddle effect on 'First and Last Waltz' is reel tape delay."
The final result sounds far more alive than most of today's glossy digital production.
"Absolutely, man! It's not ones and zeros. Somebody's life poured into coming up with it - not that people don't pour their hearts and souls into digital technology, but it does strike me as being a little inorganic. You don't want 100-percent response from what you're working with. You don't get that from humans. I don't think the help that you have in any part of the process should be perfect and uncomplaining. There was always stuff breaking down, but it just seemed right. Some things got dumped over to computer because it would be silly to totally limit yourself out of principle. Making the best record possible is what the goal is."
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