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HMB Outtake: Dan Weiss on Starebaby and more

For my recent New York Times piece on Dan Weiss’s Starebaby project, I spoke to all five members of the band (four of whom had already been featured in the Heavy Metal Bebop series, and the fifth of whom, Ben Monder, is the subject of the latest installment). I was only able to use a fraction of that material in the feature, so I’m posting extended, only lightly edited versions of those Q&As here for anyone who’s interested in digging deeper into the topic.

Dan Weiss was first featured on HMB in February of 2011 — the inaugural interview in the project. He and I met again this past January to talk about how Starebaby took shape, how a heavy Twin Peaks immersion informed the project, why Meshuggah reminds him of great qawwali music and more.

How did this project come together? 

We talked about it with Trevor and Ben and Taborn, talked about putting a band together at least 10 or 11 years ago, because we were all into this other vibe, along with other shit. But we all liked metal. But I realized that I'm gonna have to do it. So I did it, last year, '17. So [those initial conversations were] before I knew Matt Mitchell. I met Matt in 2009, and just, like, from the minute we met and the minute we played, it was an instantaneous brotherhood, and then I found out his love for [metal] and knowledge, so I wanted to have him in the band too. So I had the idea for a long time, over 10 years, and then just decided to do it, last year. And then I asked the guys to do it, and I called Systems Two, in January I called them, and I set the dates for September, and wrote for, like, six months and recorded. And that's it. So it definitely grew out of knowing that there was a community of players who had this kind of dual interest?  Yeah, and just people who were into it and really kind of knew it. And, you know, something that was kind of heavier hitting, and those were the guys I wanted to do it with.

Having had that experience playing metal with Bloody Panda, did you know that you wanted to try that someday with jazz musicians? Or did you ever consider actually looking into the world of metal to find, say, a guitar player to work with?  Yeah, that was never a consideration, just because I wanted to keep that kind of improvised world... I don't know about in the forefront, but at least split, somehow, 50/50. I wasn't thinking in terms of percentage, but I definitely wanted to have that element; I wanted to keep that intact. Guys who I had a common language with too, and kind of common history with, and kind of common performance point of departure. And it's interesting because you have these performing jazz musicians, and then you also have Trevor...  Yeah, he's doing it, man. Did you look at that as a major asset to the project?  I think it was more about just the fact that I was listening to Bungle when I was 14, and then we started to play in 2004 or 2005... I knew [he] was, like, someone more legit than us, being that he was in that world. We weren't; we were just people who dug it. I mean, I was kind of in it, for a little bit, but he's really been doing it for decades. Yeah, there's always that question of legitimacy... Are you thinking about that going into a project like this? "Can we make it as metal as it needs to be?" or something. No, because... Some people have said, "Oh, your metal project," and I don't even... It's what it is. It's such a cliché. Yeah, there's some heavy shit in there, definitely, but even in the second gig [at the Stone at the New School] on [January 6], we got to some stuff that felt just, like, looser. We just got into playing the music. So in terms of legitimacy, no. One reason is just the level of musicianship is just ridiculous... It's crazy. So who do I need to prove anything to, with these guys? Yeah, I'm just gonna play how I play, and I don't care if people think that I'm trying to do something metal and it's not cutting it or whatever... I got a daughter now; I don't give a shit. [Laughs] I didn't give a shit before, and now I really don't give a shit. That was one of the things I found most appealing is it's not trying to be a metal album, or a jazz album. It seems to me like you've just written a body of music that draws on those and many other things... I don't hear the record and think that much about genre. So it seems like you just dove into the writing... 

Totally. Exactly. Just wrote, let the music kind of just guide me, and I knew that whatever I threw at [the other musicians], it would be cool. I just wanted to try to have the right amount of balance between composed and improvised. I definitely wanted more improvised stuff than my last couple records... Yeah, and [I'm] still even thinking about, for future performances, ways to get into certain things, maybe, that we didn't get into on the record.

Given that there was some idea of taking it in a heavier direction, were there specific things from certain artists that you drew inspiration from?

 I've always been kind of a fan of through-composed drum parts, but I felt like I was definitely more cognizant for this album about that. Some of the germs from the tunes came just at the drums, with the intent of, I'm gonna try to form a tune around this particular through-composed part." So "Episode 8" and the one I wrote for Angelo Badalamenti, those two, and then "Depredation," I'd say three eighths to one half came from the drums, so that's a big thing. I had done that before in other recordings... In the Sixteen thing, that's really from a drummer's perspective, so it's hard to say that it was really indigenous to this project, but it was definitely something I was thinking about. Some of my favorite through-composed drum parts are from [Gorguts'] From Wisdom to Hate, Steve MacDonald, so that record's just been in my head for a long time, in terms of that stuff, maybe because I sat down and actually learned some of the stuff, not with double bass but just listened enough so I could see what's going on, what cycles that he's doing... I guess also just some really slow sludge stuff I wanted to get into, drawing on bands like Burning Witch and Sleep and stuff like that. I'm trying to remember... I might have been listening to a bunch of High on Fire when I was writing. it's possible, but that might have come later.

I learned the bass, the electric bass, just for the solo purpose of trying to compose.

So you wrote the record on bass? 

Some of it. Some drums, some bass, some piano, but yeah, I learned how to play. Not good, but enough to write some stuff on it. I wanted to have that perspective, just because guys in that genre aren't writing in that piano most of the time [laughs]; they're writing from the guitar, so I wanted to have that perspective.

Other things from that world... Obviously no vocals...

Was that a given from the start?  

Yeah, I knew I didn't want that.

To me a lot of the things I like in metal, and Meshuggah, I feel like they get into this, it's just like a trance zone where I get into when I listen to them. And I could say that about great qawwali music, music from Azerbaijan, anything. Just that trance, groove kind of thing, which is something that besides all the intensity and rhythmic intricacies that Meshuggah has, that's one of the main reasons why I like them, their sense of just meditative groove. It puts me in a zone. I don't feel that listening to any other metal. They've been such a huge influence on me in so many different ways. But I really feel the same way when I listen to them and when I listen to Nusrat [Fateh Ali Khan], maybe Trane... So for some of the things I wanted that meditative quality, like the ending of that tune, "Annica," I knew I wanted something like that, a kind of droney, repetitive thing to get into. And some of the other stuff, like the end of "Episode 8" [at 7:15 in the track], which is kind of Meshuggah-esque, Steve Coleman–esque, in a way that there's a rhythmic cell and then there's a melodic cell that slightly makes it skew, so it's just kind of off-kilter. But that's one of the reasons why Meshuggah gets to where they get to, is because of that snake-like quality, and it takes such a long time for stuff to circle around. So that's a definite ode, that section of that tune.

I've listened to this stuff so much that I can't help but draw from it.

It's interesting how you're mentioning the two currents, the doomy and the super-complex. Listening to this record, on some of the latter parts, I thought about prog a lot. Was any of that coming into play? 

Sure, man [laughs]. I'm still die-hard Rush fan... I was just listening to 2112 last week. Bands like that. Matt hipped me to a band called the Cardiacs. There's a lot of that. I was and still am a huge Yes fan. Gentle Giant.

Yeah, just having a broad palette of stuff, it's just in there, and that's one of the reasons why besides liking the music, you try to absorb as much as you can so that you have a lot of things to draw upon.

We'd talked about how you made a deliberate decision to stop playing in Bloody Panda. Was there something you missed there that you were hoping to recapture?

 I don't think it was an attempt to recapture, but I really had a lot of fun playing those live shows... Just that energy and excitement about playing the show. We didn't play to a lot of people but some of them knew the music and it was a show unlike when you're playing in the jazz/improvised realm, it's still great, and you can get to that energy but it's just a different experience, so I think that always stuck with me. Who knows? Maybe subconsciously part of me was trying to get to that aspect in the performing; maybe I'd been missing some of that as of late, but there's plenty of groups [where] we get into some pretty intense stuff, with [Dave] Binney, with Rudresh [Mahanthappa] and stuff I play with [Tim] Berne, it gets pretty intense, but it's just not the same. So there might have been some of that. Definitely not consciously, though.

Having seen you play a lot of jazz gigs and then with this band, I enjoyed hearing you lay into it. This wasn't, like, "jazz kicked-in," it was brutal.

 It's brutal... And I still wanted to maintain that traditional grip for this project. It's just the way I play. We did a gig in L.A. in October. I think I was even hitting harder than the Stone gigs, and I was like, "Man, I need to practice my stamina for traditional grip," because it's such a different thing, so that's one of the things I've been doing: hitting hard... I guess 'cause I've been playing this way for so long, I just wanted to still have my facility and my language that I know and that I can execute, because I really can't play that well at all playing matched [grip]; I just can't. I would have to go back in the shed for a couple years. So I wanted to keep that. But I might have played some of that for Panda, actually, matched, now that I think about it. I really can't remember; I'd have to see the video...

How did you figure out a place for both Matt and Craig in the band?

 I thought a lot about their individual musical personalities. I thought about that a lot when I was writing and how they could complement each other in the pieces, how they could play off of each other. I got together with Matt and went over a lot of the different Prophet sounds, went over a lot of different modular synth sounds, what the possibilities of those were and Craig's set-up. I kind of had that going in before I was writing, so I kind of was drawing on those things. And there are certain things that are very open, and it's just not a problem giving open stuff to guys like that. You leave it up to them, how are they going to navigate around each other, it's just not a problem. Like the beginning of "Memory of My Memory," it's kind of them two, just... "You guys, just play an intro together." And I know that they're going to be cognizant and mindful of what the sound is, and are they going to try to contrast each other or are they going to try to play with each other, play against each other. And other things I might just give them this thing and see what they do. That "Annica" one is basically a lead sheet; it's just one page of a form, and I knew I wanted Matt on piano on that one, and I just said, "Craig, do what you wanna do; do what you feel." So for a lot of it, I just let the guys figure it out. Other pieces, yeah, I was writing with them in mind. "Veiled" with that really high line with Ben and Matt playing unison, I was hearing Matt do that and I was hearing Craig that kind of gospel thing, something that I would maybe hear him do.

Yeah, if you know how guys play, it kind of takes its own course when you start the writing process. Sometimes it could be just, I wanted a keyboard thing, but I needed more than one person to do it, so I'd go, "Oh, I have two people playing this so I could have that arpeggiator thing at the end of ['Badalamenti']." I knew I want that effect, but I knew I want more than a couple lines so I'm going to utilize the fact that I have more than one keyboard...

And I should say that I made it clear to everybody before I gave them the music — even though it was my group, I really stressed to them that I wanted it to be a forum for, like, if you're hearing something in this tune, I want you to tell me; if you're hearing a specific sound, if you're not into this part, let me know. I really wanted a lot of feedback from the guys, more so than in any project I've done in the past, or any recording I've done just because I felt like this is more of a band atmosphere. I wrote the music, but I still wanted it to be more of a collaboration.

Were there a lot of rehearsals?

 We did three four-hour rehearsals. It's not that much; I really would have wanted to do more, but we got the job done. Eventually it would be nice if we could play the gigs without any [sheet] music. It could happen, maybe after a couple weeks [of] tour. It's the way to go.

You talked about the role of the keyboard, but in terms of the role of the guitar, in a metal-oriented project, it's sort of the first thing people will notice. How did you conceive of how you wanted the guitar to sound? 

Other than having that typical sound, not really much differentiation. I was thinking about Ben and just the fact that he's got a huge sound palette. But I knew that a certain intensity could be achieved with him and guitar in the band that otherwise I probably wouldn't have got to without guitar and/or Ben. But now after playing a few gigs and really knowing the capability of what those keyboards can do and just all the different range and setting and distortion, they can get there, actually... We're doing that gig next Saturday [at Winter Jazzfest] without Ben, 'cause he can't make it, but it's not going to be any less intense now, 'cause I know that [Craig and Matt] can go super brutal with their sound, super [distorted]. So it was just more the fact that I love Ben's playing.

There's obviously some ripping solos, but there's also those moments where the music drops out and it's just him, and that's a contrast that's in his own music. Do you feel like that just grew out of knowing his own work? 

Yeah, I really like his records – big fan of that stuff. I've listened to them a bunch. I haven't played with Ben so much, but I've played with him enough to know what kind of sounds are in his arsenal. I think that part you're alluding to is in "Episode 8." That's Ben; that's totally Ben. I don't know if that part of the music would have happened if a different person was playing guitar. Probably not. Maybe, though, because the tune was really Twin Peaks–based. But yeah, it was for his sound. And yeah, some of the harmonies, when I was composing, I was thinking about him. Not so much guitar that I was thinking about, just kind of his harmonic world, maybe kind of trying to tap into that a little bit – things that would resonate with him. I always like to try to do that, just write for the people in the band, write for their strengths and write for their sounds.

Yeah, and with Trevor too, I was thinking about the beginning of "Memory of My Memory," hearing him playing in this really chill way and then he switches on his distortion and... that's Trevor Dunn. 

Exactly, yeah. And it really works well on the record. I think it was just a magical thing that happened on the record like that, just like the fuckin' world just completely changed. And again, I think a lot of that has to do with Twin Peaks: The Return, man. Have you seen the show?

No, not yet.

There's really these two worlds in that show. This innocent, almost kind of soap-opera thing, but then underneath... Like a lot of Lynch movies, Blue Velvet. That switch on a dime in that tune is probably linked to that: Lynch's worlds, this duality of shit going on. And then just the emotion I feel when I watch his stuff, especially Twin Peaks. It's just otherworldly, so I wanted to capture some of that. I mean, yeah, the season started in May, and I started writing in, I guess, January or February, and I was really deep into the writing at that point in May, so yeah, I couldn't help but just think about it a lot when I was writing. But yeah, you understand the dichotomy of those two worlds if you've seen his other movies.

So what about the eighth episode, in particular?

 That episode is kind of where the whole Twin Peaks world comes from; it's like the genesis of everything... In the show he played the Penderecki "Threnody for [the Victims of] Hiroshima," and just... You know that scene in 2001 at the end where it just goes through these different dimensions? It had a little bit of that, but it had so many of these different elements: really violent, really beautiful, really serene, and it was vast, a big vista there, so I was really inspired by that. So, yeah, just wrote something to kind of encapsulate the mood that I felt watching that, because I've never seen anything like that before — anywhere, actually.

And so "Badalamenti" is referencing the music on Twin Peaks? 

Yeah, and just his stuff in general, just the real kind of pretty, yearning quality I like in his music. Twin Peaks, that theme really resonates with me. And he wrote the music for this singer Julee Cruise, and I love those records; I have those and listen to those a lot. So there's something about those that I really like.

Do you feel like because metal was on the table, there was a license to go further into more extreme places in the improv?

 I don't think so. You've got guys like Craig and Matt and Ben and Trevor, it's just part of their musical personalities, so I don't think that really informed that, the improvisational sections. They can go super left; I've played some gigs with Matt and Craig, even Trevor where it's just bananas. [Laughs] So regardless of the context, that would have been there even if it metal wasn't in the air. And I like to go there sometimes too, when it's right.

When did you meet each of these players? 

When did I meet Monder... I must have met him early 2000s, [playing with] Mika Pohjola. Maybe '04? I thought it was earlier, but that could have been right. Trevor, maybe '05? And that was with a band called Floriculture, Carl Maguire. That's where we met, and again, we hit it off personally and musically right off the bat. Taborn, I met him in Lausanne, 2001 or 2002. I was playing with a trombonist named Christophe Schweizer, and it was a double bill; Craig was playing with James Carter. I met him that night, and we started playing. We played with Binney a lot around the mid-2000s and some other stuff around then. And then Matt, 2009; I played a gig, actually with Floriculture, in Philly, and he came out. That was probably 2006, and then we played a gig with Tim [Berne] in 2009; I think it was sextet; it was Matt, [Michael] Formanek, [Chris] Speed, [Marc] Ducret, Tim, me, and that was the first time I heard him.

Wasn't there a show where you and Taborn played in Canada and Steeve Hurdle from Gorguts came? 

Yes, I was there. Big Steeve, yeah. I remember that. Probably 2005 or 2006. I forgot about that, and also I was in touch with Luc about maybe doing something through Steve, mid-2000s. Yeah, he was a great guy.

Yeah, there was supposed to be that gig with him and Taborn at the Stone that got canceled. 

Yeah, rough. Yeah, Taborn, he hipped me to definitely a lot of bands. I'm trying to remember who hipped me to Gorguts. It could have been Aaron Stewart, saxophone player. He was the one that told me about Gorguts, long time ago. But Taborn, he's hipped me to a bunch of bands. As has Matt too.

Monder's early memory of you was that Meshuggah's I had just come out and you guys had just played a show and you knocked on his door and put the headhpones on him and said, "You've gotta hear this." 

OK, yeah, we definitely talk about Meshuggah a lot.

It seems like there was a time 10, 15 years ago and you would hear a lot of jazz musicians talking about Björk and Radiohead, and it seems like now, you hear Gorguts and Meshuggah... Do you get the sense that this has become sort of a shared language among jazz people?

 Definitely Meshuggah, just 'cause of some of the rhythmic similarities and some stuff. So them, for sure. Maybe less likely bands like Gorguts and stuff like that. Maybe amongst some people, but still I don't think it's a lot. I think Meshuggah maybe more so, definitely so. It's got that steady groove to it that a lot more people can relate to, you know? I think that's one of the reasons why. And there's something about it that's a little easier for people to wrap their head around in terms of what's happening, even though it's very sophisticated, it's a little more linear than a lot of the other bands. It might be harder for people to digest that stuff and wrap their head around it.

Yeah, I think the blastbeat is still uncharted territory for some people. Speaking of that, on that drum intro on "Episode 8," there are almost these little micro blastbeats. Were you thinking about that when writing that part?

 Again, you know, since I've heard so much of that stuff... Actually, originally I was thinking about it, because originally the part was a lot faster, and so that thing that I play in the middle where it's me and Matt, where he's doing the modular synth? The first part of that is the original drum part [sings rhythm]... That was actually how I envisioned the piece. I envisioned it really fast, but the guys couldn't do it that fast, so I had to alter the drum part into that, into a slower tempo. So I had to compose another drum part. So yeah, that sound was definitely going through my head, the blastbeat sound. But I didn't want to use it because for me sometimes it gets old, and I don't have the stamina to do it, anyway.

Yeah, like a good example of someone that maybe breaks up the blastbeat is [Steve MacDonald on] "From Wisdom to Hate." That's a nice example of just a great drum part that incorporates some of that, but it's balanced; it's got some stuff happening. And a lot of bands use it but it's so disjointed, like Wormed. That's an example of, it's really present a lot of the time, but there's so much variety in the music that it doesn't get old. Was double kick ever on the table for this project?  

No. Yeah, it's a whole other skill set I'd have to develop. And, yeah, I mean, another tom-tom and another couple cymbals is a lot for me. [I have] an extra floor tom and a china and a crash. I always use two cymbals, not always, but like 90 percent of the time I use two rides. So even for me, this thing, I felt like I had to relearn a little bit of playing drums. Also because the angles are a little different; they're a little higher. That's enough [laughs].

Do you feel like jazz musicians who are into metal, that's still anomaly, or that that would be less weird these days? Is it rising? 

Hmm, not necessarily. Maybe. What do I see rising [is] more Indian music, the influence of Indian music, I think that's definitely more on the rise than it has been in the past 10 years or so... But yeah, I can't really think of many people in the jazz world that are so either versed or influenced by metal...

I think there's a certain eclecticism with this group of people [in Starebaby] that... I definitely find it in some other people, like, Binney's very eclectic. But these guys, going from Elliott Carter to Xenakis to Trevor liking Britney Spears to Monder... Yeah, just people [knowing] a lot about a lot of different music, I think it is rare. Again, you'll find people like that here and there, but it's rare. Having guys like Taborn knowing so much about so many different kinds of music and different polarities of... Trevor, his musical tastes. He just has these mixtapes in his car of just shit that's all over the map, and just listens to 'em. I was in his car a few months ago — just artist after artist, completely different, non-sequitur, just random stuff.. Another thing that I think we all have in common is any kind of new music, modern classical or spectral, or whatever; that's another commonality in the band besides just jazz and metal.

At your show the other night, there were metal dudes there, and presumably that's going to happen more, and hopefully that will go the other way too. Does this feel like a climate that owes something to John Zorn? 

Yeah, I could definitely see that. I mean, Naked City, the way the band plays "Contempt" on that [first album], that shit's brutal. I love that; that's amazing. It's got that duality world I was talking about before, the very beautiful melody by the composer Georges Delerue but it's also kind of beautiful, so there's that intensity juxtaposed with just a great melody, which I like; I've always liked that, just a strong melody, even if it's heavy as fuck. I want to be able to remember melodies that I write, so even if they're really intense and heavy... I just like beautiful melodies; I always have.

Yeah, I was a huge fan of that piano trio record you made, Timshel. I really like that that was comfortable being kind of a quiet record and a beautiful record, and the quieter passages on this record sound like they could come from that, and contrasted with the heavy stuff, it's a really cool effect. The dynamics are huge. 

Right, yeah. Well, thank you. Yeah, I just like great melodies and pretty stuff, I always have. I love Romantic composers, I love [a] good pop melody, good country music, whatever. Across the board.

So where does the name of the band come from? Is that a Twin Peaks thing too? 

[Laughs] No, it came from — we were at the beach one day with me and my wife and my daughter and Miles Okazaki and his family, and Miles' eight-year-old son looked at my daughter and said [in dreamy voice], "You're like a starebaby. You're a starebaby." And it always stuck with me: "starebaby"? And I thought about the music, and it's... I don't know. There's some correlation between just like this glazed look maybe that someone has, or something, maybe in some of the parts... I don't know. It just resonated with me, so when I was thinking about band names for the past five, six months, that one always was like — there's something about that name that I like. And, coming up with a name was a tough process. But in the end I just had to follow my instinct. And, you know, I ran it by a lot of people. Some people liked it a lot; some people didn't like it. I got a lot of suggestions from a lot of different people about names, but just had to go with that. And plus, it's a little ode to my daughter. She loves music. She's been listening to music. We put headphones on her in the womb. But she digs metal, man. She's really into it. [Finds iPhone videos of her, including one with Nasum playing in the background] ... She'll headbang.

#dan weiss #starebaby #jazz metal #heavy metal bebop #twin peaks #Gorguts #Meshuggah

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