Pinetop Seven
Darren Richard, of Chicago-based and local favorite Pinetop Seven, was kind enough to grant us an interview recently in support of the band's latest release, Beneath Confederate Lake (Amazon: US, UK, eMusic, iTunes). Many thanks to Darren for his frank and insightful responses, including his thoughts on the band's genre-defying reputation and their liberal view of today's file sharing culture. Though no live shows are currently scheduled, we hope that will change soon.
You've been part of Chicago's musical landscape for ten years now. How much does Chicago inform your music? Because even though you've used ambient noise on your recordings there almost seems something anti-urban about Pinetop Seven, not to mention a strong Southern gothic vibe.
I don't think there's anything Chicago-specific that really has much of an influence other than it's a really conducive city for making almost any type of music. There's no shortage of musicians in Chicago, and most of them are both unpretentious and musically open-minded. There's also a lot of mutual support and cross-pollination between bands.
As has often been noted, Pinetop Seven is a difficult band to pin down genre-wise. Do you think that's in part because your reference points are as much literary, cinematic and historical as musical?
I think all of those contribute, but more likely it's the amalgam of musical styles at play that I think presents a challenge to those who look for easy categorization. Myself, along with most of musicians that have contributed to Pinetop Seven, have pretty diverse musical tastes, and listen to and enjoy everything from tango, funeral dirges, 20th century classical, Eastern European, Asian gamelan, American folk and country blues, and everything in the cracks between. More than anything else, I believe it's the diverse musical influences at play that contribute to Pinetop Seven being difficult to classify.
Compared to some bands (and record companies), you take a very enlightened view about offering free mp3 downloads on your Web site. Do you find this a effective way to reach new fans? And are you concerned about the distribution of your music online in ways you can't control--such as through blogs or peer-to-peer sites?
I'm perhaps not as concerned as I should be, I don't know. We only make select tracks available on our Web site, while the remainder of the records can be found at iTunes or eMusic. I grew up on mix tapes, used records and bootleg recordings so it'd be a little hypocritical of me to get up on my soapbox and start complaining now that it's directly affecting me. I'm not going to lose sleep over it.
From what I gather, you created Barbary Coast Recordings to release Pinetop Seven albums, beginning with 2005's The Night's Bloom (Amazon: US, eMusic, iTunes). What previous experience with record labels, negative or positive, led you to this decision? What are the challenges? Do you intend to release music by other bands?
Yeah, Barbary Coast was created to primarily release Pinetop Seven-related projects. I'm not really sure what direction the label will take--I'd love to do non-Pinetop Seven releases, but I'm limited by time and finances.
Your contribution to the Will Oldham tribute album I Am A Cold Rock, I Am Dull Grass (CD Baby), is probably one of the best tracks on that record. How did your participation in that project come about?
I received an email from Thomas at Tract who invited us to participate. I agreed provided we could do "A Minor Place"--such a beautiful song, probably Will's best in my opinion.
Beneath Confederate Lake is billed as a collection of previously unreleased odds and ends, yet it has a very cohesive feel to it. What were your considerations when selecting the tracks and sequencing the album?
Emptied the closet. Had a bunch of semi-redeemable songs laying around and initially I intended to release it myself in the same vein as Lest We Forget However David at Empyrean talked me into letting him put it out. So I sequenced and mastered it and we put the packaging together. Even though it's a grab-bag collection of miscellania I still attempted to sequence it in a way that gave it more cohesiveness as an album.
Return to Shake Your Fist.
You've been part of Chicago's musical landscape for ten years now. How much does Chicago inform your music? Because even though you've used ambient noise on your recordings there almost seems something anti-urban about Pinetop Seven, not to mention a strong Southern gothic vibe.
I don't think there's anything Chicago-specific that really has much of an influence other than it's a really conducive city for making almost any type of music. There's no shortage of musicians in Chicago, and most of them are both unpretentious and musically open-minded. There's also a lot of mutual support and cross-pollination between bands.
As has often been noted, Pinetop Seven is a difficult band to pin down genre-wise. Do you think that's in part because your reference points are as much literary, cinematic and historical as musical?
I think all of those contribute, but more likely it's the amalgam of musical styles at play that I think presents a challenge to those who look for easy categorization. Myself, along with most of musicians that have contributed to Pinetop Seven, have pretty diverse musical tastes, and listen to and enjoy everything from tango, funeral dirges, 20th century classical, Eastern European, Asian gamelan, American folk and country blues, and everything in the cracks between. More than anything else, I believe it's the diverse musical influences at play that contribute to Pinetop Seven being difficult to classify.
Compared to some bands (and record companies), you take a very enlightened view about offering free mp3 downloads on your Web site. Do you find this a effective way to reach new fans? And are you concerned about the distribution of your music online in ways you can't control--such as through blogs or peer-to-peer sites?
I'm perhaps not as concerned as I should be, I don't know. We only make select tracks available on our Web site, while the remainder of the records can be found at iTunes or eMusic. I grew up on mix tapes, used records and bootleg recordings so it'd be a little hypocritical of me to get up on my soapbox and start complaining now that it's directly affecting me. I'm not going to lose sleep over it.
From what I gather, you created Barbary Coast Recordings to release Pinetop Seven albums, beginning with 2005's The Night's Bloom (Amazon: US, eMusic, iTunes). What previous experience with record labels, negative or positive, led you to this decision? What are the challenges? Do you intend to release music by other bands?
Yeah, Barbary Coast was created to primarily release Pinetop Seven-related projects. I'm not really sure what direction the label will take--I'd love to do non-Pinetop Seven releases, but I'm limited by time and finances.
Your contribution to the Will Oldham tribute album I Am A Cold Rock, I Am Dull Grass (CD Baby), is probably one of the best tracks on that record. How did your participation in that project come about?
I received an email from Thomas at Tract who invited us to participate. I agreed provided we could do "A Minor Place"--such a beautiful song, probably Will's best in my opinion.
Beneath Confederate Lake is billed as a collection of previously unreleased odds and ends, yet it has a very cohesive feel to it. What were your considerations when selecting the tracks and sequencing the album?
Emptied the closet. Had a bunch of semi-redeemable songs laying around and initially I intended to release it myself in the same vein as Lest We Forget However David at Empyrean talked me into letting him put it out. So I sequenced and mastered it and we put the packaging together. Even though it's a grab-bag collection of miscellania I still attempted to sequence it in a way that gave it more cohesiveness as an album.
Return to Shake Your Fist.
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