The difference between expectation and reality has been explained before as being the root of one’s happiness. If reality doesn’t meet the standard of what someone expects their reality to be it can create a lot of discontent. However, the inverse of this phenomena is someone being overjoyed when reality exceeds one’s expectations and they are living in a world they hardly anticipated. Listening to Nashville’s All Them Witches falls in the latter category.
All Them Witches music is an unexpected surprise that instantly feels unique and special. Charles Parks (bass/vocals), Ben Mcleod (guitar), Robby Staebler (drums) and Allen Van Cleave (rhodes piano/ keyboard) have created a powerful and deep howl with sonic tones of metal, blues, punk and heavy rock. The towering rhythms and hellfire guitar solos are surprising for how informed they are by the groove and you can usually find yourself unexpectedly dancing at one of the band’s adrenaline filled shows. Another unforeseen highlight of the group is its penchant for open-ended jams when it plays live, always searching for the magic in the moment. All Them Witches are tuned into that jamband ethos more than one would initially think and they would be a dark horse undercard showcase at jam festivals like High Sierra, Lockn’ or Jam Cruise.
You would also be forgiven if you didn’t think bassist and vocalist Charles Parks was a big harp guy. But in our revealing conversation, the down-to-Earth Parks ticks off Joanna Newsome, Dorothy Ashby and Edmar Castaneda as constantly in his musical rotation as sources of inspiration. It makes sense when you consider the layered breadth of All Them Witches’ music and the compositional edge to the songs. But you can feel a lot of different currents running through the music and who or what you hear could change depending on where you are or what you’re doing, the impressionism a quality Parks appreciates about his music.
For its latest album Sleeping Through The War, All Them Witches just ran with whatever came from its band members’ collective synergy over the course of four days of writing. The band’s off-the-cuff process produced another honest and gripping record that might be its best. The record is more streamlined and agile than previous efforts and songs like “Bulls” and “Alabaster” are potent fits of unbridled energy. Those vibes are balanced out nicely by the slow burn psychedelia of tunes such as “Am I Going Up?” and “Internet,” giving the whole album a rolling and open continuity to it like a desolate desert valley.
The group is touring the world in support of its new album, finishing up with American dates in June before shipping off to Europe for much of the summer and fall. In the midst of All Them Witches’ west coast tour Parks was kind enough to share his thoughts on the new album, playing for a worldwide audience and what is most fulfilling in his life.
What is striking to you when you play this new stuff from Sleeping Through The War ?
We knew that this album was going to be a little bit faster and more aggressive and that is fun to do live. It’s fun to do the slow heavy stuff, but sometimes I just want to jump around and yell and I get to do that with these new songs. The material is just growing at this point, so I am having a lot more fun onstage. I guess more than I’ve ever had really playing in this band. It is just more fun as time goes on.
When you started putting this stuff on record, for you, what was the starting point of this album, sonically, lyrically, psychologically, or whatever?
Right after we did Dying Surfer we kind of just threw out the word “Spacepunk.” It’s funny it came out this way because we didn’t pursue anything and just like everything we do, it just happened naturally and showed up whenever it did. We didn’t have much direction. We only had four days to write it, so whatever happened in those four days shows up on the album.
Those 60’s guys only had that much to do that and they had to be back out on the road. We only had four days to do it and then we went back to Europe. Then when we got back from Europe, we recorded it in about six days, and then went on tour again. It doesn’t work that way for every band but it works that way for us.
Is that more out of necessity or how you guys interact together as musicians and humans?
Totally, whatever you hear on the record is how we were feeling that day. Then the next day we might not have made the same record. That’s just how we work as people. Give everybody space to breathe and to have their own room, but you’re paying attention and losing yourself. You’re paying attention with what everybody is doing because you have to pay attention to the changes.
You’ve mentioned before you wanted to create a more dance-like album for your latest. The first song “Bulls” really has that going, especially with the second half of the song. The way it just races out of the speakers and the guitar tones and the way they interact with each other, it feels like a mid to late-1990’s Chemical Brothers song. What does that song mean to you?
That was one of those classic All Them Witches moments where I had half of a song and Ben (McLeod) had half a song and we put them together (chuckles). That’s happened a lot over the years. I had the second part. I’ve had that stuck in my head for two years now. The first part was probably just us fucking around, to tell you the truth. I don’t know how any of our songs are written. We seem to get the studio and have half the song done and finished in the studio or… I don’t know (laughs).
I think you sound unique and I’m sure a lot of people have said that to you over the years. Just as you operate as a musician and a human, what are the other types of bands or musicians you feel a kinship too? In other words, if you want to go share space and talk with a musician and play with a musician, who is that type of person?
The first thing that came to my mind was Can and I am new on the Can train, just within the last two years. They do the same thing we do and I didn’t know other bands did that. Obviously bands splice stuff together but Can would play for 24 hours and cut it down to an hour. They take pieces of their jams and write a whole new song from it and that’s what we’ve been doing for years. I didn’t really know other bands worked in that same kind of way. They did soundtracks. Just a bunch of weird German guys and a Japanese guy. I identify with a lot of the fat bastard guys of the music world as well. Just people who aren’t afraid to say what they mean in the emotion they fit to say it in.
Guitarist Ben Mcleod recently put out an album of his own music under the name Woodsplitter, a bunch of instrumental metal. Do you have any creative outlets outside All Them Witches or even outside of music?
Woodsplitter is great, he does everything. I do acoustic, songwrite-y stuff and I have forever. Since I was in high school I started playing acoustic and doing solo shows and I don’t get to do it very much. I’ve been holding onto some songs for 10 years now, but they still mean the same thing to me. They still hold the same emotions for me and I don’t get that with band music. Old All Them Witches albums I don’t care to play them at all, it doesn’t do it for me. But I have some songs that have stuck with me for a while. Just me and a guitar singing sad songs, that’s my other side (laughs).
Why do you think this stuff has stuck around longer than the band stuff? Do you think it’s purely because it’s from you?
Yeah, maybe because no one knows them except for me. I don’t get out and play them very much, I don’t have anything on for sale or online. So these songs are like a part of me at this point, they feel like friends as well and they’ve stuck around with me longer than a lot of human friends. I want to put out an album if it comes down to it.
You guys have seen a good reaction from Europe crowds and have even had the chance to play in Israel. What’s the music culture in Israel and greater Europe? What’s attractive to you about it?
Israel is full of the most nicest and down to Earth people you could ever hope to meet. They love music, they love partying. It’s hard to see this conflict that has been happening for thousands of years, but that is just government shit. It’s hard to see bands boycotting it, and I understand why because you can’t justifiably fund warfare. But if you pay your taxes you are doing that too. What I see everywhere I go consistently in every country and town we’ve been in is just normal people. Normal people who want to go have fun with their friends and have a good time. That’s the constant through my travels in my ten years of touring (chuckles). Everyone is just looking to have a good time and not hurt each other and not be mad at each other or through fists or be racist, it’s all about the good time. We we’re in Tel Aviv for three days and then Greece. It’s funny how fast you make friends in Europe.
What is fulfilling in life for you?
Silence. I just got to a house. I haven’t had a house in a long time just because we’ve been touring so much it didn’t make sense for me to rent a house. I’ve just been crashing in my truck and sleeping in my friend’s backyards. In December, I moved out to North Carolina and the value of silence is incredible. I feel crazy when I come back into the cities for the first few days. It’s just torture for my brain. So I’ve been thankful that I can make those distinctions in my life at this age. Just being able to separate what does the city mean to people and what does it fulfill in their lives and what does living in the country do for me and how to interact between the two. Complete silence is my life and also crazy, hellscape prison cities and screaming people are my life. Ever the two shall meet (laughs).
