HEARING VOICES
Metro Music Fest headliner Robert Pollard talks 100th record, double albums and returning to OKC
Robert Pollard needed a bathroom.
Itwas May 14, 1996, and the Guided By Voices front-manrealized the Bricktown club he was headlining didn’t provide arestroom for the band.
“I was left with no alternative but to take care of a preshow physical necessity behind the club in the loading dock area,” Pollard told The Oklahoman.
It’s been more than 20 years since that night and Pollard’s been insatiably busy ever since. Friday marks the release of Guided By Voices’ first double album, “August By Cake.” It’s also the band’s 100th album.
Here’s the math: 25 Guided By Voices albums, 23 solo Robert Pollard albums, 14 Circus Devils albums, fiveBoston Spaceships albums and 20plus other side projects, some of which issued multiple LPs. That’s not even counting live albums.
Pollard is a lo-fi recording enthusiast and has been piecing together bitesized ballads since founding GBV in 1983.
“I knew it was approaching so I started being conscious of it and got excited about it,” Pollard said. “We’ll be putting out a coffee table art book with all the album covers (front and back). I wanted to turn the pages and look at all the artwork in retrospect. The fact that it’s 100 is fairly impressive though, and it is important to me.”
Pollard and Co. will headline Saturday’s ambitious eighth annual Metro Music Fest at The Criterion, 500 E Sheridan Ave. ACM@UCO’s free downtown Oklahoma City festival features a healthy mix of national talent and more than 60 studentled acts. Nine Bricktown venues will host concerts, family-friendly events and a panel discussion all starting as early as noon.
Here’s my email interviewwith Pollard, who doesn’t own a phone or a computer.
Q: When and how did you decide “August By Cake” was going to be a double album effort? I understand you’ve tried to make a double album with Guided By Voices in the past, so what made it work this time?Robert Pollard: I originally intended for it to be a single album. I had 17 songs ready to record in New York with the band, but then I recorded six songs at a studio in Dayton that I really liked, so then I had too many songs for a single album and not enough for a double album. I asked each band member to write and record two songs each, which they did and they were all really good songs. So that’s what made it work. That and the fact that I felt there was
enough diversity over the 70-plus minutes to pull it off.
Q: What defines a great double album? Pollard: Diversity defines a good album. A lot of different types of songs within the rock framework. It has to be something that maintains the listener’s attention for a long period of time, so the songs have to be good but they have to be varied in style.
Q: No track on “August By Cake” surpasses the 4 minute mark. Why so short and
sweet?Pollard: I have a short attention span. I have a punk rock mentality. I love albums that have a lot of songs on them, like Wire’s “Pink Flag” or “The White Album.” I also was an adolescent in the ‘60s so I listened to 2 minute songs on a transistor radio. Later, I got into prog rock so I like some of the longer more worked out stuff, too.
Q: The album cover looks like a photograph of the band. What made you forgo doing your own artwork on “August
By Cake?”Pollard: Yeah, it’s a photo of Mark Shue, our new bass player. He’s only 33 years old, so it’s good to have someone young, who’s actually in the band, on that front cover. There is plenty of my artwork on the rest of the panels. Our next record, which is in the can and due for release in August, has a picture of me on the cover.
Q: I understand you record demos to an old boombox nearly every morning. How closely did the songs on “August By Cake” resemble your original demos?Pollard: Structurally, almost exactly. There were a few changes in arrangement once we began recording, but for the most part we learned and played them the way they are on the demos.
Q: You’ve penned nearly 2,000 songs. That’s like Woody Guthrie levels of being prolific. How do you even decide what to play in a live situation?
Pollard: We’re supporting
a new (double) album so obviously ... we have a lot of songs to play from that. But we also play songs from other eras. I like to choose songs from the entire catalog that I am currently interested in singing or that I think would make really good performance pieces for the band.
Q: Are there any tracks off “August By Cake” that you’re eager to perform live at Metro Music Fest?
Pollard: I like “Sudden Fiction.” I’m not sure how much time we get in Oklahoma. It’s a festival, but we’ll see. I wish we could play it all but you have to do the old crowd favorites, too. It’ll be a good mix.
Q: I noticed you had BRONCHO open for you last year. They’re a great act from Oklahoma. How’d your recent show with them at Cain’s Ballroom in
Tulsa go?Pollard: The Tulsa show was good. It was in kind of a weird, country music ballroom looking place. All the shows with BRONCHO were good and a lot of fun. They gave really good performances and got the crowd going which makes me really excited. Even though our musical styles are different, it was a good match and a good bill.
Q: You’ll be playing at a festival but at an Okie music school. What do you remember having a big impact on you when you first got started making music? Pollard: My dad turned me on to albums. Once I was hooked, he tried to get me to stop spending all my money on them. But you know, my formative years were during rock’s golden era, 1966-1979. That was all the education I needed.
Q: You’re headed to Coachella shortly after Oklahoma. Do you look forward to those big festival opportunities?
Pollard: They’re fairly painless and they usually pay very well, but it’s interesting to shorten a set and kick it out quickly. Trying to expend the same amount of energy in a shorter period of time, I enjoy that.
Q: You worked as an elementary school teacher before switching gears and doing Guided by Voices full-time. How were you as a teacher and what was that time like when you balanced teaching with your art?
Pollard: Kids liked me but I was not much of a disciplinarian. I’m sure that’s why they liked me. And now a lot of them like my undisciplined approach to making music.