Here’s the full version of my interview with Adrian Orange (Thanksgiving). We talk more about going hi-fi, living in Portland, not being legal, and balancing his artwork with his music. Enjoy!
Is having your music so lo-fi an aesthetic or a philosophical decision?
It’s both… it’s a lot based on like the means available to me. But also not really. I just like music that changes. I like the sloppiness and I like allowing room to be creative. I’ve been thinking a lot… I have this band with me and they’re backing me up and we’re getting really tight and things get so boring. It feels like you’re just getting a job done since you stop having to be creative to make the best of things and I kind of hate that when music just sits. You drive to the show, and you play the show, and playing the show isn’t any different than driving to the show, you know? I want it to be creative all the time, not mundane.
So do prefer playing live by yourself or with your backing band Lake?
But right now I prefer so much to play with the band because I’ve been so much into the craft of the music itself rather than the songs and ideas. That’s still important but it’s really been changing a lot. I used to really have a hard time playing with bands because I just really wanted to get the songs across, and the loudness of the band would get in the way. But now, it’s been feeling more unified, like the band is a representation of the whole song. It’s together more.
But it is weird. I’ve played so many shows by myself I’m still working on performing with the band and not separating myself. [Alone], it’s just you versus everybody and you’re just responsible for yourself, but with other people you can’t be unstable. You have to be the leader, you know? I don’t think I’m an antagonistic performer (laughs) but it’s hard when you have a lot of feelings to be steady. But it hasn’t been happening too much on this tour, it’s been really mellow.
Sometimes the grass really is greener. Everytime I was by myself I wanted other songs I couldn’t make, and when I was with a band I wanted the freedom to be by myself. [Lately] I pretty much just want to feel like a part of something rather than just be against the world.
Does that carry over with how you’ve been recording music in the studio as well?
I’m working on a new record and I really want it to be really hi-fi because I’ve made all these records and I feel like the songs can kind of maybe be played or recorded really weirdly and I wanted to give it a try. Just recording with nice stuff and spending more time… well I spend more time but more… maybe more like just like a record.
Is going hi-fi related to any dream of signing to a major label?
I really believe in independent music but I guess I kind of feel it’s not so much about the classification, as indie labels are working a lot like majors now. I think it’s not so much about the contrast and stuff like details as how things are actually carried out. It’s really hard … I would consider it for sure but I don’t feel like it’s necessary. There’s something that I really like about lo-fi music and indie music; it’s empowering to people who are like … it shows that anybody can do what they want … rather than the capitalist-society approved stuff … you know?
Do you think your preexisting fans will be excited or apprehensive towards your shift to hi-fi production?
I think they’ll be excited. I’ve never really been very consistent so I think anybody who likes my music will like this. (laughs).
How involved are you in the mixing and mastering process of your records?
I feel like I was kinda working towards being able to do that, like doing everything myself. Other records were working up to that and now that I’ve done that I can get over it and give over some control and collaborate more.
Who would be your dream person to collaborate with?
Gosh I don’t know. Karl Blau he said he would play on my new record. He’s an amazing saxophone player. I’m also really excited about these Lake guys.
Is Portland and inspiring and supportive community to create music in? Does living in Portland shape your musical experiences at all?
Well, I think it has been really important, but I kind of feel like it’s not quite as much now. I feel more kenneled into what I’m doing; I know how I want to channel it, and now I can kind of do that anywhere. But in terms of growing and playing music, Portland is amazing. A lot of time when I was there, my friends didn’t have jobs and lived really cheaply and were creative all the time, but it’s also been really frustrating. It’s not as utopian as it sounds, a lot of drinking and a lot of waste and a lot of drugs.
One of the really hard things is that for a long time there were so many creative people and not really enough outlets for them. When everyone is in a band, how do you get out? But it’s amazing to be around so many people and so many ideas.
You’re 20 years old. How do you think your music will change and develop as you get older?
I have no idea. I hope it gets better. It changes. I used to be a lot more into rock music and cathartic music. [Lately] I’ve been a lot more into African and dance music … more thought-based. Not nerdy thought-based but music that’s about thoughts and feelings instead … instead of just feelings. David Burns’ “Feelings” is really good. I’ve been listening to a lot of Fela Kuti, from Nigeria. Al Green. And Dionne Warwick. Robert Johnson, Bill Whithers, Nina Simone. I’ve been fucking searching for this Ethiopique Volume 9. Ethiopian music wasn’t allowed to be imported for a long time. It’s amazing. It’s kind of jazz but its not like jazz. You don’t want to snap your fingers, you know?
So as your musical influences change, so does the music you create?
Yeah I kind of feel that’s what happening. I still have all these country songs and our set kind of goes between these folk and Afro songs, and then revert back into Neil Young-style rock and country (Laughs). It doesn’t feel really genre hopping, but it is markedly different.
You’ve been incredibly prolific. How do you stay so busy?
I don’t know. I think the work is the same, the amount I can’t imagine really changing. I decided four years ago to work on this full time so it was really easy to make a lot of music, I always felt like I could have put in a little more, polished each one a little bit more. I have this inspiration to get a lot of music out there.
Do you ever feel like other musicians don’t take you as seriously because of your age?
I think people have been really nice to me, really encouraging. Especially considering when I see things or hear things that I’ve done, people have been really forgiving (Laughs). If I could go back I probably would have done things in a different way, but the encouragement has made me strong.
You’ve also done the artwork for a number of your records. Do you consider yourself an artist or a musician first?
I guess I really started to get more serious about music when my godmother and their friend got it in their heads that I would play an instrument when I was eight or nine. They pitched a bunch of ones on me, it took them a while to find what I liked, and I found I really liked to play the guitar, mostly because I was really into Nirvana. I was trying to decide what instrument to play and people told me to listen to music and you’ll know what instrument will sound the best to you and it was Nirvana’s Nevermind. And I said, “Oh I want to be like that guy.”
It really was amazing. The first thing that I ever felt was really natural and I would play guitar all day long until my fingers would bleed, and it was awesome. It wasn’t like any other instrument. And then when I was 11 or something I saw some Robert Rauschenberg painting and all those Expressionists and got really excited about abstract painting. I went to this arts middle school, it was really, really rad, like we had painting studios.
I felt I got pretty good at working with painting and abstractions and colors but not forms and representational things like drawing. I even had some art shows and sold a bunch of paintings but people kept criticizing me like, “You should learn how to draw, your paintings will better.” But even though I agreed with them, I’m not very good at handling criticism and I’m just not attracted to drawing at all. It’s only until recently I’ve gotten really excited about the craft of things, the creativity and expression of art, but lately I feel like I could learn how to draw or make a record that sounds polished. But I was so tired of hearing it and so self-conscious about hearing about my painting, like I didn’t have a right to be having these shows because I didn’t know how to draw. So I just stopped.
How do the two media influence and operate together? In conceiving a record, does the concept come to you first as a visual idea or an aural idea?
Usually it fits together, sometimes it’ll change. It goes both ways. Sometimes I’ll paint something and it’ll give me an idea for a song, like a lyric booklet with drawings in it and instructions for how to paint and that was instead of printing a huge old coffee table book. It’s usually an illustration as an attempt to flesh out the musical idea, rather than the other way around. But I’d love to make a coffee table book.
With lyrics, do you prefer to follow a narrative or is it more just impressionist images?
I feel like most of the lyrics I write now are just really trying to be honest and straightforward. Until a few records ago, I didn’t care so much about people understanding what I was saying, I just wanted to write words that were pretty and sounded good. But now I’ve realized that if I should speak I should try to communicate something, so I’m really trying to be aware of it and say things that are true. It’s very based on personal experience.
I feel like one of the hugest things that music ever did for me was make me feel that there’s someone else who is feeling the way I am feeling — disconnected to humans as a whole. And I just think it’s an amazing way to learn about interactions and real life — that the things that you feel, other people feel them too. People are same in a lot of ways. I just try to write about what I know and hopefully people will identify.
If no one knew anything about Thanksgiving, which record would you tell them to buy first and why?
Well um … I have two new records with me … either my newest record or my second newest. The newest one is kind of a springtime feeling but it’s kind of rejuvenating. The newest is kind of a sequel to the second newest. The second newest is a really a dark vibe, really wintry and pretty negative. It’s all about hiding, not being yourself. The newest one is about overcoming it and being embarrassed when you show your real self but doing it anyway. It’s meant to be empowering and encouraging to people who feel afraid to change their lives. I’ll say one of those two. [It depends] if you’re feeling dark and you still want to hang out in your cave, or if you want to come out of that cave into the sunlight.