Chip Kidd, the renowned book jacket designer, was recently in DC to judge a design collection. We had a chance to trade chit chat and the topic made it’s way to music. Kidd is certainly the only jacket designer to have his name be the answer to a question on Jeopardy. His work is wrapped around so many stellar pieces of literature that you can lose track. The authors opinion’s about his contributions are legendary as well. Even if you never read - you still have come in touch with his design via the Jurassic Park franchise (not that Kidd saw any credit once they lifted his image from the cover.) His personal connection to his Batman and Peanuts work makes for an even more powerful final product and he has even managed to pen two novels of his own in-between all of this - and yet here we were trading shop talk in for a lust for musical glory. Having put my own musical pursuits aside for a decade, I was intrigued by Kidd’s recent foray into the realm, via his group artbreak.

Teaming with the mysterious spaceman, Mars Trillion, Kidd brings an exuberance to the project but also an added sense of pressure. How many bands have their live debut covered by a New York Times review? I wanted to get a sit down with the boys before any other major papers hog all of their time. All answers from Mars (the person) unless otherwise noted.

How do you know one another initially?
Penn State dormitory floormates. He got a degree in something interesting while I got a degree in Electrical Engineering–I liked sound systems and I still think electricity is magic. Chip asked me to do special effects signal processing while he sang and played drums on “In The Air Tonight” for his arts club. We jammed in the dorm. He sweated non-stop bongo fury while I thrashed “Fire” by Hendrix. I was impressed by his straight as an arrow tenacity in the face of musical anarchy. We were to form a band, so the next school year he moved his drums into my off-campus apartment. By then, we were too busy. The Fates had other plans. We went off on separate odysseys first.

What were you doing musically in the decades between?
After college, I was issued a government secret clearance working for the national defense. Later, I was involved in research, which exposed me to toxic levels of a chemical warfare compound that left me with a heightened sensory state (fill in your preferred mutant superpower). Kharmic debt paid, I followed my bliss and went to work as a recording engineer in NYC. There was a lot of magic to soak in. At Record Plant Studios I’d jam on the piano that John Lennon used to record “Imagine” in the room that heard Hendrix record “Electric Ladyland” (and a list of other artists’ best albums). That room is now a restaurant. At Unique Studios I’d buzz up a drummer late at night and jam on Billy Preston’s B-3 organ with pedals and rotating leslie speakers at high volume.

The experience making such powerful sounds is transforming. Although revelatory to see the session greats at work in those studios, I craved the peak experience of performing live with an audience. Next working at a legendary live venue, The Bottom Line, was a step in that direction. I had several epiphanies there; for example, seeing jazz great Al Foster (Miles Davis) play just quarter notes on the hi-hat, and sensing how much better it felt than anything played by any other drummer. It boiled everything down to a zen. This guided my next gig, lasting nearly a decade, playing bass for the greatest living NYC guitarist in an explosive blues-rock power trio aptly named Michael Powers and The Powder Keg. This period included several years as the house rhythm section in a Greenwich Village club called Terra Blues. We performed with a cast of characters ranging from the greatest bluesmen you never heard of to members of Jimi Hendrix’s Band of Gypsies, Keith Richards’ X-pensive Winos, and Guns and Roses sitting in. Some nights we had 2 or more band leaders at a time joining us on stage, turning into ego-crazed cutting sessions.

For me, it was trial by fire on-the-job training within a few feet of a packed audience. There’s many fond memories of after-hours jam sessions and discussions ‘til dawn. Such a scene couldn’t last forever. I Left to join the dotcom revolution in a NYC startup called The Independent Music Network. A big idea: Anyone could post their music video for anyone to see. Market bubble burst. Venture capital bust. 9-11. YouTube finished what we started and ended up with $1.65 billion from Google! Oh well, it was all great fun. At this point I reconnect with Chip, right on cue.

What in the world brought you two back together?
Initially after college, the NYC subway system. I was running late for a studio session and regret not exchanging numbers, because “I’ll see you around” meant 8 years later. It was 20 below zero when I went to a reading of “Cheese Monkeys” at the Housing Works Coat Drive in SoHo. It seemed natural to me to offer help on a soundtrack for a movie of his first novel (it’s set at Penn State); if only as a continuation of when Chip asked me to do special effects signal processing for his performance nearly two decades prior (I have a glacial sense of time)! So I asked him if he still played the drums and wanted to jam again. Fortunately by then, the world found a new way to keep us connected– email. The first night in a rehearsal studio we bashed out Nirvana’s “Aneurysm” and other covers. The next time we knocked out an original tune, “Tracking Numb”. We picked up right where we left off at college! Only difference is that now he’s a poet too. I suppose the spirits required the time to distill.

How are things working as far as writing and recording in different cities?
Magically made simple by the marvels of technology: tele-commuting, internet file transfer, even bi-location (see mutant superpowers above). It helps to be married to a flight attendant as well. I moved out of NYC because my one bedroom apartment in the East Village was too small when my second son arrived. Leaving East 10th Street tore my heart out. Texas was the best deal for a house in the country near a hub airport (and I’m crazy about BBQ). I jet back as often as possible and Chip graciously allows me to crash in either the Batcave or Wayne Manor. When he spoke at Austin City Limits I flew in to work up a tune in the hotel an hour before tracking the demo in a local studio, then hopped on a flight out that night. When he did a design conference in Dallas, we cut tracks in the room that Willie Nelson recorded “Red Headed Stranger”. One song was an intimate guitar and vocal confessional, another seemed like an Ennio Morricone Spaghetti Western to me. Different cities add their own magic to the mix. The song from Austin sounds like country-funk. If we work in Brazil, we could samba. Most of it is done in NYC, so that energy is the dominant flavor. I look forward to working in a boat at night on Loch Ness.

What are the challenges in trying to do this in a live setting?
The challenge live is making room for the orchestra, and not letting them over-indulge while waiting to take the stage. Hey, we had a great show with just two rehearsals for a new drummer. The biggest challenge is not having roadies, yet.

The music is very New York post punk new wave in spots and something like “Lacuna” seems pretty instep with today’s sound - is this a sign of what was cool when you were in college is now cool again or are you guys listening to and influenced by current young guns?
“Lacuna” starts with the actual phone call of Chip scatting the drum groove. It’s an insight into our collaborative process (described in the song “Cliches”). He leaves a sung message on my VoIP phone line. That gets emailed to my computer. I open that file in a recording software, then slice and dice to form and spice to taste. On “Lacuna” his vocal drumming blends into a programmed drum version of his vocal. Then in the studio, Chip played drum kit over that as another layer. It’s a modern process, so that might help it sound like today’s sound. Still, I hear ABBA on the bridge.

For me, the “influences” are often just a best fit description after the fact. With a deep well of musical experiences to draw from, you never know what will come up. That’s the great element of surprise when a track takes on a life of its own. In an arrangement, I like to hear the best from several decades all at once. Ronson’s production of Winehouse is a good recent example of old is new again. Of contemporaries with direct influences, I love Arcade Fire’s Neon Bible (that influenced the orchestration of the coda in “Filigree”) and LCD Soundsystem’s Sound of Silver (“Someone Great” inspired the glockenspiel in “Asymmetrical Girl”). Actually, I’ve gone to more symphonic performances than pop concerts of late. That’s an eternally satisfying source of musical inspiration. Just the pure acoustic sound of an orchestra moves me to tears. By the way, I was pleasantly surprised to see so many artists on the 50th Grammy show, from Feist to Foo Fighters, all using orchestral sections. As always, old is new again.

What are the plans for the future (recording and touring?)
Release “Wonderground” songs, accompanying videos, and multimedia hijinks this summer. Continue work on the next collection of tunes. Hey, neither of us have been pursuing this project full time, as of yet. I look forward to that after the CD is released and world tour is scheduled. Chip is in constant demand for a steady stream of book design, cd artwork, Rolling Stone and Time magazine covers, awards dinners, and wine tasting tours! Poor fellow. Will he ever get to pursue his childhood dream full time? Stay tuned Bat fans. The Riddler has made him a design offer he can’t refuse. The man who revolutionized book design may have a few rabbits up his sleeve for the tangible music experience.

Chip - What do you get out of making music that you can’t from your design work? And writing?
CK: When I wrote in my monograph that when I was a kid I wanted to be Chris Partridge from The Partridge Family, I meant it. I played drums starting in the 4th grade and continuing up through college. So my ‘music gene’ formed way before the ‘design gene’. It’s just that the latter looked to be a more viable way to make a living doing something that I loved, and once my book-design career took off, that was the end of drums, which I didn’t have room for in NYC anyway. So now I’m returning to it. To answer your question, if writing is designing with words, then music is designing with sound. That’s an over-simplification, but that’s the basic idea. The design work that I’m known for doesn’t involve audio, so that interests me as a way to grow as a creative person. Plus, there’s something wonderfully direct about how music/songs are perceived by an audience. It becomes a real theater of the mind because you can’t see it (which is also why most rock videos are so disappointing).

Chip - there is a considered simplicity to your lyrics, what informs this direction?
CK: It’s all very, very organic and intuitive. For me the music comes first—I’ll be walking down the street and a tune (or a part of a tune) will occur to me and I’ll just start humming it and take it from there. I’ll work it out in my head for a while (days, weeks, months) until it’s coherent enough to phone into Mr. Trillion, who magically turns it into real notes. Then there’s the matter of pairing it with words. In that sense it’s Form and Content all over again. Sometimes it’s more interesting if the two are paired unexpectedly—for example, “Trees” is a lullaby about the apocalypse. As for simplicity, I hadn’t thought much about that, but certainly my design sense could be described that way. So it would figure that the lyrics are too. As with prose writing, the challenge is how to say something that’s been said a million times already in a way that’s fresh and inventive.

I actually think this might be the quickest way to get an impression of Chip’s personality as opposed to his higher profile work - what do you think Mars?
The quickest way would be to watch his at-home video interview for Dwell magazine (at www.ChipKidd.com), but the music is the best way to get an impression of his true wonderous spirit.

How do you think having a band fronted by a famous fella from a completely different discipline is an advantage and a disadvantage?
It’s an advantage because he’s famous for creative genius, not hype. All the better that it’s in a visual discipline, because music desperately needs new vision.

Do you find people surprised at how overtly “pop” the songs are?
No, because the songs cover various genres.

How do you imagine John Updike would describe your music?
Unaware of its author’s age.

Each of you answer: Favorite book of all time?
Homer’s Green Eggs and Hamlet, King James Version.

Each of you answer: Favorite record of all time?
Sgt. Pepper’s Scary Monsters Nevermind The Zoso Bullocks.

Tell me as much as you can stand to about the following tracks:

Asymmetrical Girl:
Asymmetrical Girl was conceived by Chip in the “’80’s style”, but when he says ‘80’s I hear 1980’s and 1880’s (that happened on “Filigree” too). Well, for me the verse is like The Beatles’ Helter Skelter vocal transcribed to guitar (made explicit in the breakdown), and 1980’s style meant performing it with Devo’s angular precision. That dovetails nicely with the 1880’s pizzicato ostinato of Tchaikovsky’s 4th Symphony, 3rd movement scherzo in the chorus. It’s a geometric puzzle when such a simple riff ends up with one hundred tracks of audio and a cathartic frenzied finish. You may need headphones and dog ears to hear all the layers in the last chorus. And yes, making the video was a joyous workout with a fresh hernia. I look forward to a second student-made version actually set in a High School geometry classroom for the verses and a Broadway stage for the choruses! Look for it on myspace.com/ArtbreakWonderground, and consider entering your ideas in the artbreak video contest described there*.

Trees:
I love the vibe of tunes recorded at 4am, as this was. This is an example of an arrangement taking an unexpected turn. He doesn’t censor any idea, he just raises an eyebrow and calmly says “you’ll have to show me”— there’s little discussion whether it works or not. If he doesn’t like it, I take it out. That rarely happens, and because I believe a great lyric can be arranged many different ways, it’s never a problem. Anyways, to me the pedal steel is the sound of the sighing in this lyric. I don’t think he cares much for Country music, so I was glad he liked it. Thankfully, it seems we’re not limited to any genre.

Currently, you’re hearing a demo version. This funeral may yet see a Stairway to Heaven, and some bird sounds too. I do hear some bird sounds too. Unfortunately, I imagine a video where the Asymmetrical Girl’s geometry teacher climbs a tree and teaches her Trigonometry. So, dear listeners, we invite you to send us your video or animation (for this or any other artbreak song).

Falstart:
The sandpaper guitar riff appeared instantaneously upon first playing to Chip’s phoned-in vocal. The bass line was a first take in the studio without ever having played it before. It doesn’t get easier than this bluesy punk. I love the sense of urgency, and Chip’s piss ‘n vinegar lyric. Great fun live. See you at the show.

* “ANNOUNCING ARTBREAK VIDEO CONTEST #1: As you may have seen on our artbreak Myspace page, Mars and I have posted two more songs from Wonderground—— Falstart and Trees. These are very different from the others. Falstart is more blues-rock call-to-arms and Trees is a sort of alt-folk lullaby about the apocalypse. Plus there’s an updated version of Asymmetrical Girl, the video of which should be finished in a month or two (hey, everyone’s donating their services on it, which means it gets done when it gets done). Which brings me to the point of this post. Our goal is to finish the album this summer and do a pressing of it ourselves with the video included, to be available through the site. So I got to thinking, I’d like to see what any of you budding video-designer-directors out there would do with one of these songs. It doesn’t matter who you are, if you are inspired by any of the tunes and want to do a video, contact us through this site or the myspace page with your pitch. It can be anything, as long as the proposal sounds interesting and doesn’t involve anything illegal or otherwise appalling. Lo-tech is OK, and students especially are encouraged. If we give it the go-ahead we will send you the full lyrics and a good mp3 to work with. If you complete the video in time (mid-August) we will include it on the album and the site, with full credit listed for all involved. So ready, set, go, and don’t let me hear your bored and have nothing to do this summer! xxoo CK

space them here
kidd them here

 Send to a Friend