29 July 2009 No Comment by picky bitch

PICKY BITCHS JUICY CHIT CHAT 7/ Ben Kweller

Completely stressed out I finally arrive at Berlin’s Lido where Ben Kweller is playing tonight with his band to present his brand-new album „ Changing Horses“. We have a little Interview-Date before his show, so I knock on the door, because the location is still closed.

They let me in, and there he is, sweet and obliging, 28-year-old father-and-husband Ben Kweller. He wants to do the interview in a dimly side room – I note that I might not be able to read my questions there so he disappears… within a minute he is back with a little key ring pocket lamp. „Thank you so much!“

Here we go…

Sophia: I came here straight from work, so I am a little bit exhausted right now. Did you ever have a normal day-job to make some money?

Ben Kweller: Yes, I did. It’s funny, my first job was working at the skating ring. I was a skate guard, moving around in skates, you have a security vest and a whistle. And if people skate backwards you have to whistle and say:“Hey, don’t skate backwards!“..

S.: Sounds funny..

B.K.: Yeah, It was funny, quite a good job, I worked there at the weekends. And I helped my father in his office, he’s a doctor, but I started making music so early, this was what I wanted to do, so I started playing for money..

S.: Which you didn’t stop to do until today. Everybody says your new album is all about country, what is it about?

B.K.: It’s a very natural sounding album, it’s a lot of stories about regular people, a very open and warm feeling, like I am singing right there for you. It has paddle steel, slight guitars, beautiful instruments, very down home, as we say in America. Very authentic.

S: Did you have this idea for years, to make a country album?

B.K.: Yeah, I’ ve been working on this for a long time, writing these songs, and finally- here it is!

S.: So what will the next album be like?

B.K.: The next one, which I am already working on, is very different, but it’s different from all my albums, I am gonna have a lot more layers to it, and, the songs, I guess are definitely more pop, more rock´n roll…

S: I heard that your first influences in music came from country, clasical country, but do you also like these „new country“ bands as for example The Jayhawks..?

B.K.: Yes, I love the Jayhawks, I love Wilco, my favorite stuff is Johnny Cash and Hank Williams, also Hank Williams Junior, a lot of Seventies Texas Country, they were like rebels, you know, and there is some pop country from the nineties I like, just because it reminds me of my childhood: Garth Brooks for example…

S.: In Europe Country still has this cheesy image…

B.K.: It’s the same in America..

S.: …but more and more people realise that there is new „cool“ country. Still it has this kitschy touch. Are you into Kitsch?

“a little bit kitschy though, the t-shirt??”

B.K.: Well, no, not really when it comes to my music I like to keep it more serious.. I like to listen to things that are kitschy and funny though.

S.: Do you still live in New York right now?

B.K.: No, not anymore, i moved to Austin, Texas. I was in N.Y. for nine years, but me and my wife had a baby boy three years ago, and when he turned one we said: Okay, we need a better surrounding for him to grow up…

S.: …because I thought this would be a bit of a contradiction to write a country album in a big city like N.Y….

B.K.: Funny, but most of the songs I wrote back there, because I missed my home, it’s like Mark Twain has written „Huckleberry Finn“ in Connecticut but it’s all about the South.

S.: Let’s talk about pain. How pain affects your life, may it be physical or psychic pain. Do you write about pain?

B.K.: Sure I do, but when I am really depressed I cannot make music. A lot of people say they have to be really depressed to write their best songs, I write songs when I’m in an even state. I have a good support system, my wife and I, we are very good with each other, very easy to talk to, we talk about everything, also my son, now that I am a father, I see the world through the eyes of a three-year-old, so things that seemed important aren’t important anymore, simple things become more important, I think there is less pain for me now, through him, because he gives me hope.

For physical pain, I had some, I got in fights when I was a kid, fist fights you know, nothing really bad, I never broke a bone, but I could have, I was very risky, but heartache, a few times, I’ve actually seen pain in drugs a lot, from friends,..

- proud father Ben -

S.: So there is just not so much pain happening in your life, which is great..

B.K.: Well, but there has been a lot of death in my life lately; one of my best friends hung himself, and then a year before that another friend shot himself with a gun, so a lot of suicide going on, which is really fucking crazy especially when their parents are still alive… I have a happy life, I’ve been very lucky to find love early on, we have been together for ten years and so we go through life together.

S.: This question just came to my mind. As you started so early with – let’s say – living the rock´n roll Lifestyle, do you think this is one reason for marrying and having a family earlier that other people your age? You had your „wild times“?

B.K.: It’s funny, I have some friends that share similar lives, and I feel like there is a new movement in America where people are having children younger, it’s kind of exciting, more like the nineteen-sixties.. .It’s really fun to be a young dad, you have a lot of energy to run around with them and when they turn eighteen I am still young and I can have my life back, so I think there is a lot of cool things about it and he goes on tour with me a lot, he sees the whole world, has lot of fun and experiences. Luckily there are other musicians in the music biz I am friends with that have small children too, so we can all hang out together..

S.: So it’s family on tour again?

B.K.: Not on this tour, but in America we tour together.

S.: One of my favorite questions: do you dream? Do you have inspirations through your dreams?

B.K.: Yes, I dream very vividly, I had songs in my dreams, but mostly I forget them when I wake up. It’s something I am very much interested in, I was even thinking about it the other night, in Munich, when I went to bed, like how I have to write more about my dreams in my songs, I used to keep a dream diary, but I wasn’ t organized enough to do it every day… I started to record them..

But my inspiration though comes more from being awake, everyday life, love, pain, struggle, hardship, I am very interested in people, different people, with things that we all go through, everybody has to handle the same shit, find a job, find love, whatever it is, there are a lot of things that interest me..

S.: Do you feel the financial crisis in your everyday life?

B.K.: Yes, very, very much! The music business has been having struggles for many years now, starting in the early 2000´s with free downloading and stuff, but we got used to not making money from the CD sales, so we earned money from touring, playing concerts, selling merchandise. But now with the economic crisis ticket sales are really down… a few years ago you could constantly tour America to earn money… It get’s hard now, I have to pay my band, the crew, so the crew is getting smaller, it’s getting harder and harder..

S.: Last question, my All-Time-Favorite: Do you have a fetish?

B.K.: Oh, I have a lot of weird fetishes, I love microphones, Neumann-Microphones, from Germany, they are the best! All kind of music – home-recording stuff..

S.: Typical nerdy musicians’ fetishes, anything apart from that?

B.K.: Yes, I love to go fishing!