90
Day Men
Inteview by Jacob C. Jordan III
Photo Courtesy of Southern Records
Weren’t
there rampant rumors about the 90 Day Men’s drug use?
Brian: Yeah, it started on the Polyvinyl Records message board.
The topic of the thread was “Why Southern Records sucks
now.”
Cayce: (Laughing) There were something like 81 replies in the
span of a day.
Brian: I think we were the focus of that thread. The kids called
us “The 90 Day Coke Heads.” They said we did a lot
of drugs and were total assholes.
Cayce: It was probably the same kid who wrote the Chunklet review
for the Asshole List.
How do you feel about the Chuncklet review? You guys made
their “Biggest Assholes in Music” list this year.
That’s quite a feat.
Cayce: I love it. I think it’s funny. I think bad reviews
are generally more entertaining than good reviews. I think it
should pertain to my band just as much as anyone else’s
band. That review is just brutal. It’s totally personal.
That guy has a vendetta against us…and I love it.
Brian: It backfires because it just makes people want to see
what the big deal is.
Wasn’t your last t-shirt design a quote from a bad
review?
Brian: Yeah, it said, “Overall the 90 day men are pretty
fucking pretentious.” It was a line from a Pitchfork.com
review. The review was actually a great review as far as the
writing and criticism.
Cayce: He hated your vocals. Didn’t hate my drumming…but
he sure did hate your vocals.
Brian: Yeah, he pretty much laid it out on the line.
I don‘t like your vocals or lyrics on the second song of
the new album.
Brian: Thanks asshole.
Cayce: Hahahahahaha (as he mocks Brian’s vocals)
Maybe it’s the lyrics…the whole “disappearing
completely” thing.
Cayce: Well sometimes Brian just disappears partially.
Brian: Shut up, both of you. It’s not like you had to buy
a copy.
Any songs about girls on the new record? That shit moves units,
man.
Brian: None. Well one is…a little bit…but not really.
What’s up with all the studio trickery and Pro Tools on
the album? You went from doing it “Albini style” to
using a pitch shifter.
Brian: Hey, there isn’t a pitch shifter on anything. Lots
of phase, flange, and reverb and backwards tracking.
Cayce: We used a $5000 delay on Andy’s piano. (Laughing)
A lot of the drum, the sounds, and piano parts are distorted/overdriven
or have some kind of processing effects. It’s not a super
“organic” sounding album. Was that what you guys set
out to do or did it happen in the mixing process?
Cayce: Well, it’s a combination of both. As far as processing
or effects…there was no set idea on what type of tricks
or effects we were going to use on specific parts. There were
production elements I did have in mind but a lot of the different
drum sounds are a result of John (John Congleton, engineer and
guitarist for The Paper Chase) having ideas. He would just throw
different ideas or sounds at me and then if I liked it we would
just kind of elaborate on the idea.
Brian: John was great. He would dial up a mix and have us listen
to it and say “How do you like this?” and if we liked
it he would say “Ok, now let’s try doing this to it
too.”
Sounds like he acted as a Producer as well as an Engineer.
Cayce: Well he didn’t collaborate on songwriting or give
us any of those bullshit “producer suggestions.” All
the songs were written before we went in the studio. Yet the
engineering was a total collaboration so it had an element of
having a “producer” in the studio.
Brian: He’s a friend, someone we trust…so he could
be straight with us...he had to be straight with us. We had
like no budget for this record so we didn’t have a lot
of time or money to spend…so we got it done quickly.
So you’re not one of those bands who fucks around in the
studio. One of these prima-donna bands who needs like 3 weeks
to record 8 songs and are only a 3 piece pop punk band?
Brian: No, we get shit done.
So what was the recreation in the studio? Drugs, women? Booze?
Cayce: Not in the studio. Writing was a different story. When
we write the songs we will indulge in certain substances but
not in the studio. We were sober almost every minute of making
that record.
Brian: We wrote the whole record in 2 weeks total. We would
just hole up in our practice space and play for hours and hours
every night and just bust the shit out.
Brian: Tim’s girlfriend said she played our record at her
store today. She works at a super fancy shmancy women’s
clothing store in Chicago.
What? Why?
Brian: She brought it in accidentally. It was in a Strokes CD
case. Hahaha.
Brian: Yeah, I know.
Well, you guys do have the same haircuts…that’s
got to count for something?
Brian: Oh isn’t that just so fucking clever.
Cayce: Come on, the Strokes have pretty hair.
What? You mean bad perms and bad shag?
Cayce: Yeah, no shit. Bop magazine circa ’85 bullshit.
Weren’t
there rampant rumors about the 90 Day Men’s drug use?