moodgusic met with Dylan Carlson of Earth in Belfast a few hours before their show at Auntie Annies on April 7 to talk about Earth's latest record Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light 1, Dylan's solo debut and Neil Young. Yep, good auld Neil.
moodgusic: So, how are you feeling today Dylan?
DC: I feel great, I had a great nights sleep, enjoyed the boat ride, had a great show in Glasgow..
moodgusic: Before the release of Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light 1, you had a health scare – did that give you any reservations about touring the album?
DC: Um, luckily right after we did the album I got put on a medication that helped me, so yeah that’s why we’re doing such an intense six week tour with no days off. Then when we get back we’re doing the States so I’m pretty much healthy again.
moodgusic: So the tour hasn’t taken a toll on you at all.
DC: Well, I can’t have fat ‘cause I have a bad liver. So it’s a little hard in the British Isles [laughs], they seem to slip in fat, butter and cream and all kinds of stuff. But I’m okay.
moodgusic: The record was produced by Stuart Hallerman, who also worked on Earth 2, what ideas did he bring to the record and what was it like working with him again?
DC: It was really good working with him again, I’ve known him – I knew him for years before we did Earth 2, he lived in Olympia [Washington] at the time I first moved there. He’s really one of those like great, ‘just-get-it-to-tape’ as smoothly as possible - he’s not like a Phil Spector type y’know Wall of Sound sort of – it’s just very natural and trying to get the best sound to the tape as possible and he works really fast. He has an amazing attention to detail, especially with the pro-tools and stuff ‘cause I don’t know how to do any of that.
moodgusic: He was an engineer on Earth 2, was it a similar experience to the one back then?
DC: Pretty much similar, I mean obviously we’ve all y’know.. Like we were joking while we were doing this album about all the stuff we would’ve done different had we known what we know now, but of course it wouldn’t have been the same record. On that album we did a lot of kind of crazy things that technically were wrong I guess [laughs] or shouldn’t have worked but somehow it worked for that. But yeah this album just went really smooth, I think that’s why we got so much done, y’know recording two records in one..
moodgusic: So you’ve record all of Angels of Darkness 2..
DC: Yeah it’s mastered it’s all almost done.
moodgusic: So it’s mixed and everything, all that’s left to do is set a release date?
DC: Yeah.
moodgusic: Do you have any idea when that will come out - next year, yeah?
DC: No, actually originally we wanted to do them both this year but Greg [Anderson, founder of Southern Lord Records] wasn’t sure if he could do that so we had talked about pushing it ‘til next year. But now this one seems to be doing well and we’ve talked with Greg but haven’t figured out yet, but some time between October and the end of the year probably.
moodgusic: You’ve been making music for over two decades now, do you ever go back and listen to your older records?
DC: Not so much. Usually only if we’re going to like play a song in the set off one of the older albums, um but I don’t really like, I mean after I’ve worked on it and it’s mastered, and I hear the mastered copy that’s pretty much it. I’m not a big ‘oh, I love to listen to myself’ kind of person [laughs]. I mean I like what I do and I’m proud of it, but I’m always looking ahead, at least musically, I look in the past, in other ways.
moodgusic: You’re a fan of Neil Young, even with ‘Old Black’, the first track of the new album being a nod towards Neil’s guitar – I’d really love to hear your thoughts on his last release Le Noise?
DC: Oh, the doom record. [laughs] I’m still processing that record, I mean it’s funny ‘cause it looks and it seems like it’s an early Sunn O))) demo or something, the cover. And then it was kind of funny ‘cause it was like, even though it’s got all that heavy guitar and stuff it’s funny ‘cause it’s really at heart a singer-songwriter record like his old ones only it has this sort of weird thing..
moodgusic: It’s almost like the record that you both would’ve made if you collaborated.
DC: Yeah, [laughs] I was like joking: ‘‘damnit he’s staking his claim to everything now, now he’s going to be the inventor of doom!’’ Everyone will say oh he’s the father of grunge and now he’s the father of doom. Nah but I love Neil Young and Daniel Lenois’ a great producer, I would love to work with him someday but obviously I would never be able to afford it. [laughs]
moodgusic: You never know, stranger things have happened.
DC: Yeah. His take on it seemed a little more digital in a weird way. Maybe he didn’t want it to sound as warm, maybe he was going for that cold black metal sound or something. [laughs]
moodgusic: You’ve spoke about the idea of doing a solo record, and with Angels of Darkness 2 finished, do you think that’s something you’d like to do next year?
DC: Yeah that’s my goal, either when we get off tour this year, we have a couple offer for sort of festivals things in October and December. So hopefully, well Winter’s probably not the best time to travel around the British Isles, but I want to travel around England, Scotland and Ireland to record it. So either then or right after the new year is when I want to record the solo record so hopefully it’ll get out by next year.
moodgusic: Do you have any ideas right now as to what you’d like to tackle with the record?
DC: I do, but it’s something I’m kind of keeping secret right now.
moodgusic: Sure. What do you think about the name: under your own name, something else or even Earth?
DC: No it’ll be under my name. It’ll be something different, ‘cause for me with Earth like there’s certain things that need to be there like it needs to be slow and long, especially Adrienne [Davies] now has been in the band 10 years so if she’s not there I don’t really feel like it’s same. So if I’m going to do something different I don’t think I should call it Earth ‘cause I don’t think that would be fair. Like if I was going to do synth-pop and try and sell it as an Earth record that would be like, ‘cheeky’ I guess you would call it [laughs] or ‘cunty’. [laughs]
moodgusic: Curse away I don’t mind. [laughs]
DC: Okay I didn’t know if this was.
moodgusic: Nah, it’s fine.
DC: You never know what interviews you can swear at.
moodgusic: Fuckin’ curse away all you want. [laughs]
DC: [laughs] I’ve heard the Irish enjoy cursing.
moodgusic: [laughs] What do you think about the idea of a visual album, maybe you guys writing a piece of music for a film or someone making a film to a piece of your music. What are your thoughts on that?
DC: I would love to do like, I mean we were lucky and that song got used in that Limits of Control movie, that Jim Jarmusch film and apparently he named the character of ‘The Driver’ after the song. But yeah I would love to actually get to do a soundtrack where you watch the movie and record something for it.
moodgusic: Have you heard any more information about the Swedish, or was it Norwegian filmmaker who made film with your music?
DC: Yeah our manager Clyde [Peterson] went and saw it, I missed it, he then met him and he makes animation films so he went to some kind of class with him.
moodgusic: Is there any information you can give just so those interested can look him up?
DC: Uh, no I haven’t. I don’t know that much, other than he made that film and it’s inspired by our music and stuff like that. Unfortunately I didn’t get to meet him.
moodgusic: I watched a video online of your track ‘Seven Angels’ set to the film ‘Eraserhead’. It worked very well, both the music and film are really dark and slow -what kind of film could you see go along maybe with the latest record?
DC: Well the movie I was watching the most when I did this record was my copy of Pans Labyrinth, the Guillermo del Toro film. That movie Centurion about the Roman guys that get stuck in Scotland and they’re massacred.
moodgusic: Were you able to take influence from them for the record, ‘cause it seems to have a Western, desolate desert aesthetic to it.
DC: With this one, I was listening to a lot more English folk rock and reading a lot of Celtic myths and stuff like that so that was more of the theme I was going for although country comes from Celtic music so it’s all the same. It’s all the same ball I guess. [laugh]
moodgusic: What releases have you enjoyed the most so far this year?
DC: My favourite new band is ‘The Unthanks’ who are these Northumberiansisters that do like Scottish and Northumbrian folk music. And then there’s this band that we’re going to tour the East coast with, it’s one person it’s this girl Geneviève [Castrée] but the band’s called ‘Ô Paon’, she sings and plays guitar over like loops’ of her voice and the guitar. She’s French-Canadian. What else have I really liked.. ‘Mount Eerie’ we were going to tour the South-East with, they’re from Anacortes [Washington], they play a giant gong and then he picks random musicians to play with him. I really like ‘Sabbath Assembly’, yeah I really like their record.
moodgusic: When I was checking my ticket this morning, I noticed their name was spelt wrong.
DC: Oh really? [laughs]
moodgusic: It’s spelt A-s-s-u-m-b-l-y on the ticket. ‘That’s not the same band, is it?’ I thought. [laughs]
DC: [laughs] But yeah I like their record.
moodgusic: What records are you looking forward to being released?
DC: I sort of find stuff by happenstance, like that band ‘The Unthanks’ I just got some British magazine and read about them doing a King Crimson cover of Starless, which his one of my favourite King Crimson songs so that’s what sort of drew me to the record.
moodgusic: That's great, thanks for the interview.
Earth's latest release Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light is out now on Southern Lord Records.
Unedited Interview recording~[audio http://moodgusic.files.wordpress.com/2011/04/afa4e-interview_with_dylan_carlson_of_earth.mp3]
Interview_with_Dylan_Carlson_of_Earth.mp3
