Jul. 01, 2009 - Issue #715: The Bestest of Edmonton 2009
On the Record
Bruce Peninsula
Open up and say, 'Ah' : Bruce Peninsula's A Mountain is a Mouth
VUE WEEKLY: Geography appears to play a large part in the band, from the name of the group to the album title to the lyrics to the incorporation of running water in the music of "Steamroller." Is that grounding in the surrounding world something that you're conscious of, or has it developed naturally and subtly?
NEIL HAVERTY: We are all intrigued by the idea of regional eccentricities, especially in music and art. But also in jargon or behaviour or terrain or lifestyle. The fact is that a person's surroundings will have some hand in everything that person does. At the very least, it plays the witness. That's an endless bounty, as far as songwriting is concerned, wouldn't you say?
There's a certain weight in that kind of imagery that's hard to find elsewhere. Some sturdy, hefty quality we like. There are a lot of different ways to explain the size or reach of how we feel, but it's really tough to argue with a flood or a fire or a mountain range. Or a peninsula, for that matter. It paints the picture immediately.
VW: There's a real feeling of unity between the album's tracks. Was there a sense that the band was creating an album as opposed to a collection of individual songs?
NH: It was definitely the plan to create one body, rather than just a collection of songs, but mostly that's just the logical conclusion of a year or two spent crafting a live show. We have always been mindful of the fact that we're there to entertain people—for 30, 45, 60 minutes at a time.
We take the flow and sequence into consideration every time we play, so obviously the end recorded product should reflect that.
That said, we made decisions about the record that we wouldn't normally decide about the live show. We didn't have to end the record with a banger, for example. In a live show, we wouldn't put two slow songs at the end.
VW: Recording for A Mountain is a Mouth began in June 2007 and carried on for a year. How much of that was steady recording versus weekends?
NH: Very little was done on consecutive days. We had a couple of bursts of productivity throughout that year but it was mostly a piecemeal schedule. Whenever we could get a group together or anytime somebody had a spare afternoon to add some of their parts, we'd find a place to record and make it happen in the time we had.
It's taken us a while to get a handle on how to coordinate this band in a truly efficient way—we still haven't really figured it out—so it took more than a year to get everything we wanted to hear on to the record.
In the end, 15 musicians contributed to it. That's a big group of people, with their own lives and projects to consider, so we kinda just used whatever time was on offer and came out the other side with this beast of a record.
VW: It was recorded over that time in a number of different locations. Why not just hole up in one spot for the duration? What was the advantage of doing it in different spots?
NH: Next time I think we're all looking forward to spending a solid chunk of time in one location. Some of the recording locations for AMIAM were chosen very deliberately—we chose St. George the Martyr because we knew the vocals would shine there and we finagled our way into the basement of the University because we knew there were lots of great instruments stashed there—but most of the other places we recorded in were chosen based solely on what was cheap and available to us.
We even halted recording for a couple months to help our engineer Leon build a studio. Actually, the studio, at least partly, was built in reaction to how much we had to move around to get the project done. That's why our band spent so much time putting up drywall, anyway. We needed a home base for the final stages of our record, so we just plain built it.
VW: The record is a dense work, with many layers that weave in and out and over and under each other. Was it a difficult project to work on in the studio?
NH: Recording wasn't difficult. It was time consuming, sure, but recording was the fun part. We knew that each song implied a lot of different melodies and rhythms and we wanted to identify and highlight as many of those as we could.
It got difficult in the mixing stage, though. We had no limits when we were tracking, but then that made a huge pile of music to sort through when it came time to mix. When we were mixing, we were pulling out our hair and sort of decided that next time we'd impose some boundaries.
It was a glorious privilege we allowed ourselves—no new part was ever denied—but the same rules won't apply when we go to do it again. It was just too much stuff to sift through.
VW: The music sounds incredibly organic, with shouts and claps alongside the instruments, but those are tempered with an angelic choir that appears throughout. How much of the sound of the finished record was planned in advance, and how much was the result of studio experimentation?
NH: The extra textures and finishing colours were created in the studio, but the fundamental characteristics of the songs were there from the beginning. Thick vocal melody and strong rhythmic momentum are two songwriting qualities that we'll always rely on. Those are the touchstones we always head towards first.
If you start from there, not much changes once you start decorating it with overdubs. The aesthetics morph a bit—things sound a little cooler or weirder—but the essence of a song should remain intact with or without those embellishments.
VW: How do the multiple layers of the record translate to the stage? Is there an attempt to recreate the studio sounds or do you come at the live performance as something completely different?
NH: We generally feel that the live performance and recorded work should be judged on their own merits. There are things that can't be captured live but can be explored on record, and vice versa. The record presents a very steady-handed and calculated version of the songs. A live show is a lot more unpredictable and unhinged. Anything can happen in the heat of the moment.
We love that duality. It makes playing music twice as fun. Enjoyable in two very different ways. We wouldn't have it any other way. V
Thu, Jul 9 (9 pm)
Bruce Peninsula
With Rock Plaza Central
Brixx Bar & Grill
New comments for this entry have been turned off and any existing ones are hidden. We apologize for any inconvenience.