INTERVIEW // SWANS
I
t seems that throughout your career you have always run away from other people’s expectations. Do you ever run away from your own expectations?
Well, that’s the idea. I don’t really care about other people’s expectations. The main thing is keep myself interested and if I’m interested, and my band is interested, then I think what we’re making will be compelling to an audience… And if it’s not, that’s tough luck.
Charles Bukowski once said, “You have to die a few times before you can really live.” It seems that you have embraced this philosophy as a musician. In retrospective, do you agree with Charles’s words and do you think that it can describe your career? Oh, I don’t know. That sounds very melodramatic, much as Charles Bukowski’s work. Charles Bukowski, he is not a great writer but to me he’s a friend in a sense that I like reading his books, it’s like having a talk with somebody in a bar. It’s not great literature but it’s reassuring and comfortable. But as far as that philosophy, I don’t know. I constantly like to be in an uncomfortable place and I think that makes room for better art so that’s why things keep shifting and changing.
Well, I guess that’s what he meant. The shifting and changing. I mean, when Swans started up again a few years you said that it was not a reunion but rather a reconstitution, like talking about walking on a new road, changing things.
Yeah, but I think actually what he was referring to is that he almost died a couple of times… from his drinking, of course. He came very close to death and I think that might have giving him more urgency in living. I guess I’ve been close to death a couple of times but… yeah, it gives you urgency but a couple of days later you forget all about it and you get wrapped up in the usual daily bullshit.
You said, and I quote, “The Seer took 30 years to make. It’s the culmination of every previous Swans album as well as any other music I’ve ever made, been involved in or imagined.” With that in mind, how would you describe “To Be Kind”? Well, I would say that the previous album was the culmination of the entire history of the world and universe, all in one. [laughs] And this one is perhaps a visit to your local supermarket.
Someone said that today’s bands and musicians don’t write an album thinking about the possibility of that album turning out to be one of the best albums of the year, decade or even of all time. Where do you stand? Do you think about those things when you’re writing and recording an album? No, that’s the way a rock critic would think. I just try to make the best music I 64
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June