Colour Me Impressed

1. Title Tracks live incarnation’s members have a resume that features bands (e.g. Corm, Q and Not U, Explosion, Good Clean Fun, Kid Dynamite) that might not lead the listener to expect the type of sound the project has. Is the 50’s – 70’s pop sound something that you’ve always been into or is it something that you’ve developed more of a taste for since your more aggro-projects?

Older music is something I’ve always been into and it started working its way into the music I was involved with around the time of Q And Not U’s first record.  There were moments that we would incorporate into our songs that reminded us of groups like Bread or Chic or Barry White or The Carpenters or something like that and we would never hesitate to cop to an influence like that, even though it wasn’t really discernible to someone who didn’t know us.  I think when people heard Q And Not U, they had a really limited idea of just how many different kinds of music that we liked/heard went into our final songs.  Often, it would even bum people out to know that we didn’t listen to … I don’t know, say At The Drive In, Les Savy Fav or some other sort of current rock bands and that, instead, we pulled from people like Fela, Augustus Pablo, XTC, Caetano Veloso, The Heptones, Francois De Roubaix etc.  Anyway, I feel like for most of my time in music I’ve never really drawn from the sort of music I was playing, if you know what I mean.  So, I suppose Title Tracks fits in with that, even though it doesn’t fit in with what I’d done before.  As for Michael and Andrew and their musical pasts, they’re both such good, dedicated, dexterous players, that you could really put any music in front of them and they’d be at home with it.  Similarly, they also have very broad music tastes and have played different kinds of music for as long as I’ve known them, so it doesn’t seem strange to me for them to be playing with Title Tracks.

2. You’ve got your radio show 1-2-3-4 More More More on WOXY.com, which features a pretty eclectic mix of music, and lends a lot of insight into Title Tracks’ influences. Do you try and run a theme through each of your shows, or is it more of records you’ve been into that week type of structure?

Well, it does stick to a format in that I’m only playing rock-based music.  I focus primarily on power pop and punk and then also sneak in some new wave, indie rock and post-punk.  I do primarily play older music, but I’ve been trying harder to play new stuff.  I think I went through a phase where I was sort of dismissive of current music, which is a really weird attitude to have.  I’m not sure where that came from exactly, but I think a lot of it was that I was just being competitive.  Anyway, I’m really happy now to find good new music and play it on the show.

3. Speaking of records you’re into – what are your current musical highlights (albums, live performances, etc.), the things our lives would otherwise be amiss without?

In the same spirit of what I mentioned above where I’m trying to listen to more current music, I’ve also been getting out to more shows lately.  I think I was so burned out from touring that I didn’t really feel like going out to shows when I was at home anymore.  Now, though, that I’ve had nearly a year off the road, I’m definitely recharged and am excited about going to see bands.  I also was feeling a little detached from the D.C. for the past couple years as things had really changed from how they were for the entirety of the time I’ve been going to shows and getting involved.  But, lately, I’ve been getting back out and seen a bunch of bands in the past month or two: The Points, Headlights, Obits, Edie Sedgwick and others.  The Points were definitely the most revelatory.  They’re really great, especially their drummer.  As for records I’ve been into, I suppose I’d suggest people go listen to my radio show (www.woxy.com/music/1234mmm) ’cause that’s a good portion of it.

4. Living in DC I’ve been fortunate to catch you live a handful of times between here and Baltimore, any plans for expanding the touring beyond these two cities anytime soon?

Most definitely.  We wanted to take it fairly easy until an album came out.  With Georgie James, we played out of town a lot before we had any releases out and that really strained our confidence, energy and budget, since night after night we played to people who didn’t know who we were and didn’t know the songs.  So, the plan with Title Tracks is to not push too hard out of the gate and just play in the region until there’s an album to support and then get out there properly.  So, we’ll definitely do lengthier touring when the album comes out later this year.

5. At the show you mentioned that your album should hopefully be out this summer, are Andrew, Michael and Meredith helping on that too, or will it be more like your demos where you handle most of the duties?

I’ve already finished the album and I played everything myself on it, with a few exceptions.  Kriston Capps (from the band Gestures) played saxophone on one song and Tracyanne Campbell (from the band Camera Obscura) sang with me on two songs.

6. You’ve suddenly been given the ability to travel time, do you go back and mess things up, or do you leave it alone (this of course assumes that simply going back in time doesn’t inherently mess things up)?

I would leave it alone.  I’d be really happy to just get the chance to go back observe.  I’m not sure why, but I’ve always had a fascination with how things used to be and I would love to just go back and look around, even if I couldn’t change things or interact.

7. Record/musical moment that most changed your relation to music? (e.g. Mine would be a tie between catching Nirvana on SNL in ‘92 and the first time I heard Minor Threat, since that’s when I realized that music can be subversive, dangerous and cerebral).

There’s no way for me to come up with just one.  I can definitely think of a few moments and they’re all pretty much around the first time I heard albums that were crucial to my life (Replacements’ “Let It Be,” Rites Of Spring’s s/t album, Fugazi’s “Repeater,” the first Dinosaur Jr. record, Sonic Youth’s “Daydream Nation,” R.E.M.’s “Chronic Town”).  The punk ones are the ones that really stand out, since I was a little older when I was first hearing those.  Music is involved in many of my earliest memories (my brother’s Kiss album melting next to the coffeemaker is probably as far back as I can go, around age 2), so it’s kind of just always been a part of who I am.

8.  Henceforth you are only allowed to listen to records recorded within a period of ten consecutive years, what ten year period do you chose?

Hmmm, ‘77 to ‘87?  ‘61 to ‘71?  ‘99 to Now?  Don’t know for sure.

9. Anytime I caught you in Pittsburgh (where I used to live until just recently) with Q and Not U or Georgie James, you were always plowing through one book or another, and you’ve blogged about the books you read in 2008. How’s 2009 shaping up literature wise – have you come across anything excellent?

Well, thanks for noticing.  I just finished a book called “Turn The Beat Around: The Secret History Of Disco” that was a really nice, succinct, thorough history of the genre.   There haven’t been any mindblowers really so far this year, though David Wojnarowicz’s “In The Shadow Of The American Dream” (a collection of his journals) was really moving, though very hard to read as the end of his life drew nearer.

10. Dischord.com makes mention of your “holy-grail-stocked record collection,” what record are you most geeked out to own, and what’s currently on top of the list of records you are on the look-out for?

Records that I’m looking for would be Mark Eric’s “Midsummer’s Daydream,” Clovis Roblaine’s “The Clovis Roblaine Story, ” Arthur Alexander’s “You Better Move On,” Chris Bell’s “I Am The Cosmos” single on Car, and the s/t record by The Toms.  Ones I’m psyched to have would be The Michael Guthrie Band’s “Direct Hits,” The Spongetones’ “Beat Music” and Tommy Keene’s “Strange Alliance,” among others.

MP3: Title Tracks – Found Out