Yeasayer's vocalist/guitarist Anand Wilder chats to Spoonfed about that difficult second album.
Brooklyn-based Yeasayer exploded onto the scene through their performances at 2007’s SXSW showcase in Texas. This was followed by an ambitious debut release packed with soaring tribal rhythms and mangled melodies. Lost to most musical lexicographers, the band shelved their definition as “Middle Eastern-psych-snap-gospel.”
Fast forward three years, and they’re in the UK and Ireland to promote their second – more clinically produced – album 'Odd Blood', selling out their London night at Heaven.
Yeasayer have a sound which really splits opinion. What’s the least accurate description you think you’ve heard?
I don’t know, I’m never really disappointed – I’m always more impressed when people can notice all the different references that we have in our music. If someone says that we sound like Enya whatever, I’m happy about that.
What do you make of the reaction of your new record, 'Odd Blood'? If anything it seems like it's producing a really emotive response.
That’s great, you know. When we set out, I remember saying that people would either love us or hate us, and that’s better than being somewhere in the middle: “Oh you know, it’s OK – kinda sounds like Neil Young…”
But with that, as an artist, do you feel any responsibility to please your established fans?
I don’t think we have any responsibility to our fans. I think we have a responsibility to each other; to keep progressing. Someone may read into our lyrics and be really offended, but that’s not me, that comes from their misinterpretation.
How do you go about writing the follow-up to a critically acclaimed debut?
We had a few set ideas about production and how we wanted to arrange it. But we had a lot more time with this record – so we could be much more meticulous about it. We were also able to take many of the songs to play them live, see how they translated to the live show – which changed how they’d sound on the record. It was much more luxurious.
But as a band, and as writers, it was pretty much exactly the same- very computer-based, travelling songs back and forth between each other.
On the first record, 'All Hours Cymbals', those harmonies – joined with layered percussion - helped create a real tribal effect. The percussion seems to take a bit of a back seat in 'Odd Blood' though.
I think it hits a lot harder – there’s a lot more compression on the drums. We went for more simplistic beats because we wanted something you could actually groove to, dance to…
…and that wasn’t present in 'All Hour Cymbals'?
I think so, but I think, when we played our first record – it never really hit hard, you could never hear the vocals that much, or that snare drum pop in the mix; partly because there was so much shit going on.
On this new record we wanted to remove that extraneous crap so that the backbeat would really come through – there is this real sense of clarity.
So the live show was always in your mind for this record?
I think the album was definitely inspired by the way we cut the fat out of the songs from the first album. After the shows people would say, “I loved your show, but I didn’t get that from your record”. So I hope that’ll get closer and people will like the record equal to the show. I think there’s an advantage of taking an album out on the road: you get tighter and tighter, and it becomes more natural.
Thanks to Nita at Goldstar PR.
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