A few years back Christian Wargo and Casey Wescott of the Fleet Foxes began joining forces with brothers Ian and Peter Murray of the Christmas Cards. Amazing, right? What started as a long distance musical affair has become Poor Moon. The band just released their EP Illusion on March 27th and hit the road to complete their tour with Lost in the Trees. Touring is hectic as hell and I can’t begin to explain how grateful I am that Christian was able to do an interview. It’s truly amusing, a must read.
Katie: Y’all just came back from SXSW, understand you had some van troubles, but you’re back in action. How does it feel to be releasing and headed out on tour as Poor Moon after years of long distance collaboration?
Christian: It feels cool. It’s like the good ol days. Even the van problems and the insane drives are cool in a way. Especially once you pass through it. It makes for some good stories. SXSW was a trip. I love the energy of that fest and I had fun, however, I was glad to leave by the end. I don’t enjoy trying to load into a club while being yelled at by cops and city workers who don’t give a shit about my plan. The streets are closed to traffic and you’re not going to convince them that it is impossible for you to carry your gear down three crowded streets through thousands of drunk folks (bless their hearts) to deliver your stuff to the club. They don’t care and have heard it 100 times already that day. Don’t they realize how important this is for me?!? Lol.
K: Ha ha, damn that is a hassle. I recently began realizing how much work being a musician really is. Props. How is life in the van? Who does the driving, who is in charge of the radio?
C: Van life is a barrel of laughs. One perk to being on tour with tight bros. We laugh a lot. Everyone is always trying to snap the best Instagram pic. And when we stop at gas stations KC will sometimes call dibs on a certain point of interest… Claiming rights to an exclusive shot of a mountain range or a cactus or something. Ian has a different approach. He tries to take the worst picture possible or capture the least appealing aspect of a city.
We take turns DJing. We stop often. We get stoked when we see a Flying J truck stop, because of the vast selection and the bathrooms are usually pretty alright. We sleep. We talk of many things. We stare out the windows and imagine what a cloud would look like if a huge shark bite were taken out of it.
I’ve hooked up a power inverter to our van battery and so we have full on POWER!!! This is cool because we have an electric cooler for groceries… A Nespresso espresso machine. We also have a juicer and propane stove, but we have yet to use them. Good intentions though. Jared, our front of house sound engineer is pretty good at making breakfast and I imagine one of these days he’ll get around to doing that. Jason (our drummer) does a lot of driving. He wears heavy boots, which probably helps. But we are all thrilled that he likes the morning shift cause the rest of us stay up late.
K: Can’t stop laughing, that’s great. You’re on the road with Lost in the Trees, love their new album, you guys are headed all over the country. Are you looking forward to playing any shows or visiting any places in particular?
C: We were all really looking forward to Seattle since it is home and we haven’t really played a ton of shows in town. It was a great night. Our CD release show. Sold out. Had a great time. I always love stopping by Chicago. So much good food. The best Thai place I’ve ever been to is Uptown called Thai Siam Noodle and Rice. NY is always a hoot. As is Philly. I’m originally from the east coast and my folks are still there. Always nice to see them and old friends.
K: How was the project born, and when did releasing and touring come into play?
C: I guess after Crystal Skulls I just kept writing songs and didn’t really have much of a plan… Being a fan of Peter and Ian’s music I would send them my demos. Just cause they enjoyed getting them. KC and I would hang out and play records up in is old house in Shoreline. There was a practice space there and we would usually end up playing some of my demos and/or jamming or adding stuff to the demos. Over the course of a few years, while things were starting to kick off with Foxes I starting dropping hints to Peter and Ian about being in a band together. I think at first it was just a nice idea, but eventually it seemed real enough to them that they moved back to Seattle and we started recording stuff in Ian’s house. Originally it was intended to be “preproduction” for the “real” album but parts of those sessions ended up being the EP and LP. We recorded 16 songs over a year and a half, in between Foxes tours. Later, we brought in Jared and did all the basic tracking in Ian’s house and then took stuff to various studios in town to cut vocals and additional stuff that was too quiet to record in a house due to weird electricity or passing cars and planes, etc… So yeah, 16 songs. 5 of which are now the EP and the rest will be on the full length.
K: How would you describe Poor Moon in comparison to the work you’ve done in Fleet Foxes or Crystal Skulls?
C: I would describe it as a more personal project. The songs were written over a few years, which is a first for me. This is why there are a lot of different types of songs. I like that a lot about it. Being a fan of lots of different music, I like being able to try different things and I think this band reflects that.
K: Poor Moon is named in honor of a Canned Heat song, can you tell me why you felt this song title was a good fit for the project?
C: Besides liking the way it looked and the imagery it evoked, I guess I felt a certain connection to the premise of the song. It did seem sort of ridiculous in a way… But at the same time it was sincere. I don’t think Alan Wilson thought it was a joke. He was genuinely worried about the moon being destroyed by mankind. I think it works (for me) because I feel that songs should exist in their own world. They can have their own set of rules. They can be anything and each song can live in its own universe. I find that the songs I like the most tend to come from a slightly odd place or have some sort of mystery around them. Anyway, I don’t feel there are a lot of similarities between my music and the music of Canned Heat… I just felt the premise of that particular song struck a chord in me and it stayed with me. I just liked it.
K: How do you feel about the music industry as it stands today? With the internet, technology and accessibility/piracy in general. What do you think the future of the industry holds, and what can we do to make sure our musicians get the compensation they deserve?
C: I really don’t know. I don’t feel particularly affected by it. At least I don’t really pay attention to it much and I don’t think about it. I don’t personally have strong feelings about how people get a hold of music. I am stoked when people want to support music by buying a CD or a t-shirt at shows, etc. I think there’s a strong emphasis on that at this point. I think a lot of people really do get it… And they genuinely care about certain bands and musicians. To show their love they support them by going to shows, spreading the word about a band and buying the bands stuff. I’m probably just better off doing what I enjoy doing, which is making demos and recording songs and playing those songs with a band.
You can get Illusion and info on tour dates on Tumblr + Facebook. Download a free MP3 of the song above at Subpop. Bad ass. They’re touring all over the map so be sure to check em live if you can, you won’t be disappointed.
By: Katie McVeay| Spokesperson |Music Without Labels & Beat-Play, LLC | crookedsunshine
