John McCauley sounds like shit.
Not on the new album by Middle Brother, of course; heavens, no. On their self-titled debut, McCauley and fellow front men Taylor Goldsmith and Matthew Vasquez sound great, each bringing his own flavor of musical talent to the table.
The three each hail from their own well-established indie bands (McCauley from Deer Tick; Goldsmith from Dawes; Vasquez from Delta Spirit), allowing the music press to slap a “supergroup” label on them just on general principles.
The fact is, this is the most non-supergroup-acting trio you might ever hear. Neither their album nor their live shows have a whole lot to do with ego or attitude – what Middle Brother thrives on is the sheer goddamn joy of playing music together. Playing it well. And, above all else, just playing.
Which may explain why John McCauley sounded the way he did when I got him on the phone. Middle Brother had returned from a stretch of performances at SXSW (something like, oh, 84 shows in 4 days or whatever).
In the end, the interview was similar to a live, late-night Middle Brother set: smiles and good times with an undercurrent of “this thing could go hurtling off the rails and down into the canyon at any moment.” Me, being the suave professional that I am, start things off on what I’m pretty sure is the right foot …
BR: In the interest of being completely honest with you, John, I feel like I should tell you this: you sound like shit, man.
JM: (laughs, then coughs, then laughs some more) Naw … I’m doing (cough) okay. (laughs)
BR: You’ve been crazy busy between the Middle Brother gigs and Deer Tick and whatever else, right? You should get some orange juice or something …
JM: I had some orange juice yesterday … (laughs)
BR: Jeez, seems like that ought to do it. Well, while I’m on this run of being completely honest with you, there’s this: I doubt that you have much time to read reviews, but just in case, I wanted to tell you right up front that I’m the guy who wrote that your vocals on the Middle Brother album “vacillate between sounding like a Tuvan throat singer with a four-pack-a-day habit and a half-drunk-and-broken-hearted Paul Westerberg.”
JM: (laughs) I did read that, actually.
BR: Well, believe it or not, it’s meant to be a compliment.
JM: Oh, it’s cool; it’s cool. (laughs, then coughs)
BR: Speaking of Mr. Westerberg, why did you choose to cover the Replacements’ “Portland” on the Middle Brother album?
JM: We were playing the Replacements’ Don’t Tell A Soul album a lot while we were in the studio – listening to it over and over. And we were screwing around, trying to do a couple covers … “Portland” was the one that worked out. (laughs)
BR: Ah – it must’ve been the reissue with the bonus cuts.
JM: Yeah, exactly.
BR: As much as I love The Replacements, I’ve never listened to any of the reissues or compilations – so until your album, I’d never heard “Portland”. In fact, until I read the liner notes, I thought you guys had written it and were quoting from the Replacements’ “Talent Show” – the “It’s too late to turn back; here we go!” line.
JM: (laughs) Right, right …
BR: From this album and your work with Deer Tick, I’m guessing Westerberg’s one of your musical influences.
JM: Yeah, he’s up there. Definitely.
BR: Who else?
JM: Well … I’d say my three favorite bands are probably Nirvana, The Band, and The Replacements.
BR: You can’t go wrong there …
JM: Yeah. And then a bunch of singer/songwriter guys like Hank, Townes, Paul Simon … stuff like that, as well.
BR: I won’t go on and on about The Replacements – I think we’re supposed to be talking about Middle Brother –
JM: (laughs) Yeah, but, you know … The Replacements are cool, too …
BR: Well, I did want to ask: did you ever see the clip from that hokey International Rock Awards Show or whatever it was back in the late ‘80s?
JM: Yeah – that’s where they did “Talent Show’?
BR: I loved that!
JM: It’s great, man. (laughs)
[Note: For those who’d like to know more about this moment in rock ‘n’ roll history, here’s some suggested reading and some suggested watching which, between the two, may give you a little extra insight into John McCauley and Middle Brother’s approach to music and the art of live performance.]
BR: It summed up The Replacements’ history in, like, three or four minutes of live rock and roll. It’s like watching a drunk up on a tightrope: “He’s gonna fall!” “There he goes!” “Ahhhh!” But he never loses his footing and I think it’s fair to say that there’s a certain amount of that at a Middle Brother show, right?
JM: I guess we present ourselves in that same way. (laughter) We’ve just recently realized that some of our favorite bands did shit like that … we’re not the only band that plays drunk. (laughs)
BR: Hey, speaking of the band as a whole, it seems like the rest of the gang doesn’t usually get a lot of attention in the press. How about we talk about them for a minute?
JM: Oh, yeah – that’s cool. Taylor’s brother Griffin Goldsmith from Dawes is on drums. We had two drum kits on stage during the East Coast tour … every now and then somebody else would hop on the other set and we’d have two drummers at once. Dennis Ryan from Deer Tick has sat in on drums with us.
Tay Strathairn from Dawes and Rob Crowell from Deer Tick have both played keys with us. Wylie Gelber from Dawes comes in on bass for a few songs when, you know, I’m not playing it. (laughs) And then we have Jonny Corndawg, of course.
BR: Ah – yes: Jonny Corndawg. On the album, he’s on the title cut, right?
JM: Yeah – he helped write that song with us.
BR: Well, fill us in – the world needs to know more about Corndawg.
JM: I couldn’t agree more. (laughs) I met Corndawg, like, six or seven years ago when he was working in Philadelphia. We just became friends over the years and started playing more shows together.
Corndawg was living in Nashville while we were recording Middle Brother and he was working on his own record right down the street. He’d kind of just pop in about once a day to see how things were going and hang out and whatever.
We wrote this song together – me, Corndawg, and Taylor – and when it came time to cut it, we asked Jonny, “Why don’t you sing a verse?” It turned out great.
Delta Spirit, Dawes, and Deer Tick have been Corndawg’s backup bands at one time or another – and he’s been out on tour with Middle Brother. Corndawg’s basically as big a part of this band as anyone else, you know? For me, his presence is there on the record … even though he’s not playing or singing on a lot of the songs, his influence is there.
BR: And he has an album coming out?
JM: Yeah – it’s called Down On The Bikini Line.
BR: So here’s the question you’ve probably been asked a million times already and will be asked another million times before it’s all said and done: I’m guessing you guys have orbited in and out of each others’ musical circles for a while now. Was there a slap-your-forehead moment of saying, “Damn – let’s make a band out of this thing; let’s do a record!”?
JM: Ummm …. actually, me and Matt had never met before the first day we were scheduled to be in the studio. (laughs)
BR: Really?
JM: Yeah. It was gonna be just me and Taylor – we just hung out together for a couple of weeks to write. Then Corndawg kind of made his way into there and Matt wanted to come up – he and Taylor knew each other. I said, “Yeah, sure …” (laughs)
So Matt flew up; I picked him up at the airport; we had a beer on the way to the studio – and then we did three songs in one night. (laughs)
BR: Oh, wow – which three?
JM: “Thanks For Nothing”, “Daydreaming”, and “Blue Eyes”.
BR: Pretty good for the first sit-down together.
JM: (laughs) Yeah … and then Griffin came in to play drums on the second and third day of recording.
BR: Ah – so you must’ve overdubbed him onto “Blue Eyes”, then?
JM: Actually, the drums on “Blue Eyes” are, like, double-layered. We recorded that the first night with me playing just the bass drum, the toms, and the maracas – that was the original idea we had. But we ended up overdubbing Griffin on the high-hat and snare.
BR: “Blue Eyes” is a great stick-in-your-head tune. I’ve referred to it as a cousin to that old Neil Young tune “Dance, Dance, Dance”. Taylor’s laying down those roundy-round licks that sound like some crazy-ass fiddler – only he’s doing it on a Tele.
JM: (laughs) He’s got some chops, man.
[At this point, dear reader, we’re going to pretend this is a radio interview you’re listening to – maybe some hip NPR program, okay? And we’re going to cut away to some music right now – the tune “Daydreaming”, a John McCauley-penned song that opens up the Middle Brother album:
Early in the morning too hungover to go back to sleep
Every sound is amplified, every light so dizzying
Listen for a while to the neighbors having sex
Wishing I could lay my aching head upon your breast
Can’t I dream another dream?
Can’t I close my eyes and wander back to sleep?
But I’m daydreaming about you
I know that it’s wrong
That I’m daydreaming about you
‘Cause I’ve been daydreaming for so long
A Bloody Mary afternoon, waste my time out in the sun
Hum myself some melodies, maybe I can sing you one
Maybe I could find you sitting down at the café
Maybe I could join you at your table today
Can’t I just get what I want?
Can’t I be the man that steals away your heart?
But I’m daydreaming about you
I know that it’s wrong
That I’m daydreaming about you
I’ve been daydreaming for so long
Yeah, I’ve been daydreaming for so long
Later in the evening take the bus down and see the show
You’ll be behind the bar, I’ll get a beer,
Leave a tip and lay low
I’m just a kid that gets his drinks from you
Who stands around and doesn’t have a clue
Can’t I hold you close to me?
Can’t I ever say to you just what I mean?
But I’m daydreaming about you
I know that it’s wrong
That I’m daydreaming about you
Yes, I’ve been daydreaming for so long
Oh yeah, I’ve been daydreaming for so long
There you go, folks: four-minutes-and-fifty-seconds of finger-picking sweetness and throat-scraping heartache.
And now back to our interview with John McCauley.]
BR: I think “Daydreaming” may be the best hangover song I’ve ever heard.
JM: (laughs) Thank you.
BR: Is there a story behind that we can talk about – or is it, uh, too painful to relate?
JM: No, it’s okay. That was written about when I was a teenager sneaking into this bar to drink and there was this one girl – a bartender – who used to serve me even though I was, you know, underage. I kinda had a thing for her, which never, uh, went anywhere. (laughs) That’s what that song is about.
BR: And was that one of the tunes you wrote during the sessions for the album?
JM: No. I actually wrote it a couple months before we started the Middle Brother project. I was in Madrid and couldn’t sleep because the neighbors in the next hotel room over were having, uh, really loud sex. (laughter)
BR: I remember being stuck in a dingy motel up in Canada years ago. It was my birthday, I was all by myself, it was colder than hell in the room, and everything stunk of fishmeal. There were a lot of trucks that lugged fishmeal that used to frequent this place, I guess. And that was the deal: next door to me were a couple of truckers and their, umm, dates for the evening. It was awful. It sounded like a porno version of the bar scene from Star Wars…Anyway, let’s move on. So you had some songs already in your pocket before the sessions started?
JM: Yeah, it was a mix. Me and Taylor wrote some stuff for the album, but he also had some songs that didn’t work with Dawes. And then Matt wasn’t there for the writing part; he came in with some songs that he had written that didn’t fit with Delta Spirit.
BR: The album works as a collective, though. Other than the change in who’s singing lead on any given tune, it doesn’t sound like three separate EPs spliced together or whatever … there’s a true group vibe to the whole album.
JM: Thank you. I’m glad it turned out the way it did.
BR: So where do you take things from here?
JM: Well … we don’t really know what we’re doing. (laughs) Dawes has a new record that’s about to come out; Delta Spirit’s working on a new one; and Deer Tick’s about to go in the studio to start recording.
So we’re not sure what to do with Middle Brother after this spurt – we are playing the Newport Folk Festival, though.
BR: There are worse things than having so many cool projects going on, right?
JM: Right. (laughs)
BR: Okay, well good luck with everything that’s going on and thanks for taking the time to do this. And, you know, take care of yourself.
JM: Oh, yeah … I’m having some vitamins right now. (laughs)
