Earlier this summer, Landslide Records issued Scrapomatic’s latest studio effort, I’m A Stranger (And I Love The Night). This is the fourth album that Mike Mattison and Paul Olsen have released together since they founded Scrapomatic thirteen years ago. They recorded it at Swamp Raga Studios, the home facility of Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi, which came about through Mattison’s efforts as a vocalist first with the Derek Trucks Band and more recently with the Tedeschi Trucks Band. Meanwhile, Olsen has occupied himself with a variety of additional musical endeavors and has garnered two ASCAP songwriting awards.
Scrapomatic is now officially a trio with longtime collaborator Dave Yoke lending his guitar to the band. In the following conversation, Mattison talks about Scrapomatic’s development and the group’s upcoming plans, which include a gig on Sunday, December 9, in New York City at Joe’s Pub.
I’d like to start out by talking about a few of your quotes from your official band bio which I found rather amusing and insightful. Right off the bat you say, “Blues, roots, Americana, country, yeah, that’s us. But we’re not just trying to update the sound so the kids will like it. In fact, fuck the kids.” Now I assume that’s somewhat tongue-in-cheek…
Oh no, it’s not tongue in cheek at all. I said that because I get frustrated that sometimes the people around us would like us to try to be current and contemporary but that’s not what we’re about. We’d like to exist outside of the popular milieu and listen to our forbearers and what they put down and try to take that forward and not really keep an eye on what tends to be popular or what’s interesting now, in terms of what’s on the radio or what’s on television. It’s just trying to really make and conceive what we consider to be art and hence, “Fuck the kids.” Now I like kids, I have a kid; I just don’t want to be held up by what the current popular consumption is because it’s not fun, it’s confining and I’m not interested in it.
Here’s another one that’s destined for my office wall: “The trouble with band bios is that they become lists of influences…Metaphor has replaced simile. It’s disrespectful”
I guess I’m talking about how other artists or performers are characterized in the media. I’m just bemoaning the lost art of the rock critic. I used to look to certain magazines and people to point me in the right direction, and now it’s really become more of a PR campaign. People say like “this person is Aretha Franklin” or “that person is Sam Cooke,” or “they are the Grateful Dead.” It’s not helpful, I don’t find that helpful as a person who’s seeking out music and consuming it and living with it; it kind of hurts my feelings. I’d rather have a class of people who are really directing me towards what I need in terms of music.
In terms of the ongoing dynamic between art and commerce, as an artist who’s committed to pursing your own muse while harkening back to the past, I’m interested to hear what you think of social media and its impact.
I think it’s a good thing. The fact that artists can go right to their people is terrific. And it says a lot about artists, you have to be active, not just in terms of performing and being in front of people, which I don’t think was necessarily the case when I was coming up in the 80’s and 90’s—it was more about how record companies and people could push you. But now you just have to hit the road, get in your rental car or your van or your bus or whatever, and be in front of people and make an impact. And then you can kind of double down on that with social media and be in intimate contact with people. I think that’s great. I think that’s wonderful. At the same time, it does take a certain element out of the equation, which is editorial, it takes editors out of the equation. And I think editors have been very helpful to the consumer. But in terms of what it makes the artist do, in terms of getting off your ass and getting in front of people and being in contact with people and being in communication with people, I think social media are terrific.
In terms of how people receive their media now days, you look at 70’s FM radio, pop radio, which was so much broader and now it’s really about niches and narrow bands. I’m curious, do you think that works to your benefit in Scrapomatic, or do you think it adds an additional challenge.
I think it works, because we’re never going to get there. It reminds me of being a younger person in the early 70s, 80s, early 90s, and it was an us versus them thing. There really was an alternative underground music scene, and people will always make that. People will always create what they need and find the people who want it, and I kind of like it. It really reminds me of being a kid in the 80s, and going into people’s basements on the weekend to hear a certain band and it works. It makes it even more interesting and intriguing that it’s not being sort of anointed from above and sent down. You feel like you’re a part of it and that’s great. I think there’s an audience for Scrapomatic, I think we’re finding them and I think it’s easier to find that audience with social media. I am enjoying the current situation out there in terms of music land.
Just one more quote…we premiered a track, “Night Train Distant Whistles” on Relix.com, and you commented, “Essentially this song is about running away from your problems, which we recommend.” It that true, do you recommend that?
Well I don’t think it’s a healthy solution but it’s fun.
That song is one of just a couple you co-wrote with Paul on this album. A few others are credited to yourself alone but in terms of the songs that he composed, what are the challenges for you in singing songs that you didn’t write. To what extent will you go back to Paul and say, “I just can’t sing this” because you might not be comfortable with the sentiment.
Oh no, I feel perfectly comfortable. I mean I write some of the songs but it’s pretty much down the middle, Paul writes the other part of the material and we collaborate quite a bit. I think Paul and I, our friendship is based on our shared sensibility of how we encounter the world. Anything Paul writes, pretty much I’m 100% behind, and usually say, I wish I had said it that well and that concisely and that wonderfully. Whatever Paul writes I’m 100% behind, whether it’s nice or romantic or unfriendly or whatever, we’re pretty much on the same page.
You mention a romantic sensibility. It seems to me that a few of the songs on this album are a little sweeter than the earlier Scrapomatic material.
I think you’re absolutely right. Actually Paul and I have talked about that a little bit. You know we’ve been doing this for years and years, about a decade and a half, and at a certain point we’re like “We’re not just dirtballs who want to write about other dirtballs,” we’re actually, I wouldn’t say well-rounded, but certainly fleshed-out human beings. Maybe it’s time to write some love songs, or songs about relationships that aren’t just about loss and bad feelings. I think Paul wrote two gorgeous songs, “How Unfortunate For Me” and “I’m A Stranger (And I Love The Night),” I find just really uplifting, beautiful pieces of work and it’s just a pleasure to be able to sing them.
Given your role in the Tedeschi Trucks Band and the Derek Trucks Band prior to that, people see you out there when you’re performing with Scrapomatic. What’s Paul’s musical focus outside of the group?
You know, he’s generally just a songwriter. He works various jobs and keeps his life together in New York, but he teaches guitar lessons and people also put him together with other songwriters, and he’s kind of a song doctor in a way. I don’t know if your readers would really know people that he’s worked with. That’s kind of his strength, he has his own unique vision. The unique thing about Paul, unlike most musicians in general I think, is that he’s a terrific collaborator and he’s very empathetic musically, lyrically, emotionally and intellectually. He works with a lot of people just helping them get their projects together. I’d like to see him do even more of that going forward, because he’s extremely good at it.
In terms of the latest Scrapomatic album, was there a precipitating factor or moment that led you to decide it was time to record again?
You know it’s been four years since the last album and we’ve been demoing. Paul and I live in different cities. I’m in Atlanta; he’s up in New York. He’d been coming down and after tours we’d get together and demo all this stuff, getting stuff ready for an album, and finally we were like “What are we waiting for? Let’s just knock this out, this is ridiculous, we’re taking too much time.” I think just life got hold of us but we realized we needed to kick this back into gear. We’ve been stockpiling so many songs, literally we could put out a triple album of quality material, not even our b-list stuff. So we were like “we just have to get this going” and hopefully after New Years we’re going to go in and start recording another record.
What about the challenge of maintaining Scrapomatic as an entity, with both of you having other gigs and responsibilities?
It is a challenge. I think what we’re learning though, is that because we’re both so busy maintaining and doing other things, the amount of time we can actually put into Scrapomatic is actually working out perfectly. If we were given the gift of all the time in the world, I don’t know if we could even do it full time, knowing the responsibilities we have. It’s kind of a decade-long conversation Paul and I have been having together and it’s not one that we want to stop, but it’s just good to keep it going. It’s going to keep going.
The two of you founded the band but Scrapomatic is now officially a trio?
Yeah, we have Dave Yoke playing with us, pretty much constantly now. So that’s been a real gift. Especially for Paul who otherwise had to be all of the music: you know, the rhythm section, the back up singer, and the guitarist. So Dave really frees up Paul and adds this extraordinary, improvisatory thing that he does to what we do. The guy’s just a masterful musician. Usually when we go out now it’s Dave, Paul and I, and then when we’re lucky enough to have Ted [Pecchio] on bass or Tyler [Greenwell] on the drums we’ll do it. But it’s not always financially feasible, or feasible in terms of scheduling. So it’s really Dave, Paul and me who are out there doing it.
I haven’t seen you as a trio yet. I always imagine Scrapomatic as a duo or more recently as a quintet…
You know it’s interesting, you don’t usually see two guitar players and a guy yelling on stage. There are some interesting challenges. People are not used to seeing or hearing this, so it’s kind of fun to just play with it. We’re always talking about how we can make it better, how we can make it different. Musically, it’s an interesting conundrum that we’re dealing with and it’s really fun to do. Obviously, we’re all really well matched, we’re all really good friends and share the same sensibilities, so we have a great time.
In terms of your new album, you are the lone credited producer. Can you talk about how that came about. Sidewalk Caesars you co-produced with Jeff Bakos.
Well, one person has to take the blame, and I’m the guy on this record. Sidewalk Caesars was kind of a different process, we really worked with Jeff Bakos very closely and he was really a big part of how we got the sounds that we did and how we made the record that we did. This time someone really needed to take the reins in terms of choosing the material, rehearsing it, and sort of figuring out the microscopic stuff that needs getting done. So I said, “I’ll claim this one, for better or worse.” But you know, we had wonderful engineers, in Bobby Tis and Marty Wall and we recorded mostly down at Derek Trucks’ studio in Jacksonville. so there are a lot of people who made it happen. I was the producer in the sense of the movies where they call it the line producer. I was the organizational guy behind it, that’s why I’ll take that title.
I think people would be interested to hear what it’s like recording at Derek’s studio. Would Derek and Susan come in with a sandwich, check out the sessions and maybe give advice? Or perhaps did they make a point to leave you on your own?
Well it’s at their home, it’s on their property and it was very kind of them to open that up to us. It’s not a commercial studio, it’s their space, so they were very nice to let us come over there every day for a week and let us wreak havoc in their place. They were kind of in and out of town while we were doing it. The way we looked at it was “Please come, and participate, and give your input.”
Derek would come in and listen and see what we were doing and try to be encouraging, and not direct how things were going. But they were interested in what we were doing and we certainly appreciated their input. Bobby Tis of course was instrumental in building the facility, and his father as well, Robert Tis, senior. So he really knows how it works from a technical aspect. He really just got us set up, got us going, and Marty, who was the DTB’s former front of house guy kind of kept it going in terms of engineering. So Marty and Bobby collaborated well, and it was just really fun. It’s really unusual that people have a studio and it’s unusual that they’ll let outside people come in and use it and say “Hey, have free rein, this is your time to get your vision accomplished.” It was very generous and we’re still grateful for it. It was just a wonderful experience.
So there are 12 tracks on the album, just in terms of the flow of the record, I’m curious about the thoughts that went into that. I would think that in 99% of the cases such an album would end with “The Party’s Over,” which is the second-to-last track. What was your thinking there?
You know, at that point in the process I’d checked out a little bit. I used to be a big purveyor of mix tapes, way back in the day, and it was all about the placement of songs within songs and I’ve kind of given up on that. As long as the songs are on there, people will find them. I’m not against the concept of an album—in fact I’m very pro-album and how things flow and how things fit together. But when you start doing track listings, it really becomes a group effort, and not just the musicians but also other people around it. People have very strong opinions, and that’s where I’m just kind of like, “As long as they’re on there I’m okay with it. That’s all I want.”
As it turns out, the album ends with one of my favorite songs. I’m not going to have you dissect every song, but can you talk a bit about “Gentrification Blues”?
You know, that was a song in the works for years and years actually. I wanted to write about leaving Brooklyn, where I lived for eight or nine years but also something I thought about as I lived there, you know a kid from the Midwest who moved out to New York as people do—they gravitate towards big cities, want to make a name for themselves or prove themselves, something like that.
Well I was interested in people’s stories. Like, what are we doing here? Why do we deserve to be here? What about the people that have been here? And isn’t it nice that the government and people are recognizing that people are coming back again, but what happened in the decades when they weren’t coming back and people’s college-educated children weren’t sowing their twenty something roots there? Years and years of people lamenting the fact that they can’t afford to be in these places, living amongst people who kept these cities alive. It’s a complicated subject, but it ends up being about people’s nostalgia for cities. And how you can’t just maintain the city nostalgia, I guess.
I started writing it about five years ago and another thing that really prompted it was something that happened when Paul and I first moved to New York. We were living in Fort Greene right next to Myrtle Avenue, which at the time was still called “Murder Avenue” and we thought we were such bohemian warriors being there. We thought we were so terrific. I remember, we were walking down the street one of the first days we’d moved in there and this woman opened her window to really do a public service to Paul, not me so much, and said “Hey white boy!” And he’s like, “Yes? You talking to me?” And she said, “Are you okay, are you lost?” And he said, “Yeah, I live here.” And she looked at him like he was a Martian, and said, “You live here?” And to me, that was the seed where that song came from.
I want to mention one other song. I’m curious about “Malibu.” What prompted that one?
I don’t know if I should really say where that song comes from, but…sure I will. It’s about California, but it’s also based on a strain of marijuana called “Malibu.” I don’t really smoke it, but some people in our band do occasionally, and it ended up being an exploration of California, and what is California? Again, being a Midwestern going out to California and Los Angeles, Malibu, even San Francisco, it’s like visiting another country. And in popular music right now, probably starting back with the [Red Hot] Chili Peppers in the 90’s there were all these odes to California, and how people can’t understand how wonderful California is, and I just never got it. So we wanted to write a somewhat anti-California song, so that’s what that is.
Do your songs become Scrapomatic songs from the moment of inception or do you sit with them after they’re completed and try to formulate what might work best with Scrapomatic?
I think that’s why Scrapomatic exists. Again, I like to say that Paul and I have been having this conversation musically and otherwise for years and years and years. It’s where all these things that don’t quite fit, with artists Paul happens to be working with or me just musing around and thinking about music and knowing that an idea might not be appropriate for the Tedeschi Trucks Band. It’s like the island of lost boys: any idea is just welcome at the Scrapomatic table. Or as Dave Yoke likes to say, “Everyone is welcome at Paul and Mike’s dojo.” There are just no rules, as long as it’s quality, it’s acceptable.
So that’s kind of why we have this thing that we have. It’s so we can work stuff out and take our time and throw it back and forth and it’s ours and we don’t have to worry about what people are going to think about it. As long as we agree on it, it’s a place to go. So, it’s kind of an old school collective and it’s a good feeling to have that artistically. I think a lot of people are out there second-guessing themselves quite a bit, in terms of “Where am I going to place this?” or “Who’s going to like this, how can I craft this to make it palatable?” And we don’t have to worry about that in Scrapomatic. If we can crack each other up and if we can get each other in agreement then that’s all we need. It’s a rare thing to have. I don’t think a lot of artists have that and we’re very lucky.
Scrapomatic has opened a number of dates for the Tedeschi Trucks Band. How have those audiences responded?
Well, I think it’s interesting. Especially now that Susan’s crowd and Derek’s crowd have been combined, have been forced to combine, whether they like it or not—they’ve heard a bit of shit about that—it tends to be people who are very open-minded, people who are very much in love with the blues. There are a lot of classic rock people from the Allman Brothers area, a lot of jam type people. It’s not just older people either. It’s people across the board, finally equal amounts of men and women, and I think they really like what we’re putting down.
We find that we’re very well received, and maybe they’re just tolerating us but it’s a really interesting audience. Really a credit to Derek and Susan and the Tedeschi Trucks Band that they’re drawing an interesting cross-section of people who just aren’t getting what they want, I think, out of music in general. And I think they’re coming to this band and I think word is spreading. I think it’s a word of mouth thing. I don’t think it’s a top down phenomenon at all, I really think the word’s just getting out. If you really like music and you like the history of music, and you like American roots music, then this is a place you can come to and have a good time. And I think Scrapomatic benefits from that.
In terms of Tedeschi Trucks Band, were you surprised when Derek and Susan committed to such a large band and have maintained the numbers of the group on the road?
I’m surprised they’re maintained it, I am. It’s a hell of a commitment, organizationally, financially, etc. If you want to go out and make a lot of money, don’t have a twelve-person band. But, I think creatively, having that palette and having this group of talented people that you can lean on and rely on and turn to and be inspired by, I think it has energized Derek and Susan. It’s taken a while to find the right people, but everybody to a person in this group is just astonishing in what they bring to the table. It’s an amazing group of talent but also a credit to Derek and Susan for being able to kind of guide it. It’s an unwieldy creature and they’re been able to define it and really make it something. So it’s just a pleasure to be a part of it, it’s really fun. Every night something different happens, it’s unbelievable, it really it, it’s a hell of a group.
I have to say, I have a deep respect for what they’ve decided to do.
Oh my god, even if you’ve watched the Mad Dogs & Englishmen movie with Joe Cocker, and you’re like “Oh, that looks like fun and the music they’re putting out is amazing,” the offstage stuff, like how do you herd around twenty people is insane. I don’t even want to make a metaphor because I’ll insult somebody, but it’s a lot of work.
At the Beacon where a number of artists sat in with the group did you rehearse in advance? It seems like it would be a challenge for someone to fit in with that much sound. Or are those mostly done on the fly?
At the Beacon actually we did rehearse. We went to SIR on the West Side of Manhattan there, and did a day. And some people came in, like Eric Krasno, and people who happened to be in town stopped by and we worked some stuff out because there are so many elements and you can’t really wing it. And of course we also had the stage every day, so we had some folks who would come in during sound check, and we’d make that work. You have to be pretty deliberate about it, you can’t really go seat of your pants with so many folks.
Thinking back on your time with the Tedeschi Trucks Band, is there a moment, either with a guest, or another moment on stage with the group that really stands out for you?
For me some of those moments have been, not necessarily having somebody sit in, but just being on stage with this group of people that you love and that you respect. And being at a venue, like Red Rocks for example, and saying to yourself, “Wow. We got over, people get it. We did it. We did what we set out to do.” And you see people in the audience who are singing words, maybe that you’ve wrote, and they know them, and it’s just very moving. It’s very humbling when you hit those sweet spots and you’re like “Hey, this thing that we’ve all given up so much to do is really working.” It’s a hell of a feeling. Like I said, it’s quite humbling.
You mention that you’d like to go to in and record again with Scrapomatic. What other plans do you have for the group?
Again, it’s hard to get anything done with Scrapomatic. We’re going to do a series of New York shows in December, and we’ll keep doing little bits and starts here, but especially when Derek amps it up again with the Allman Brothers, we really want to have Paul down to Atlanta and just start laying down songs. There’s so many, and if you don’t record a song it sort of ends up drifting into the ether; you forget about it. Recording a song kind of makes it real to a band, and there’s so many we need to get real, so we’re just going to kind of start that process, of getting our catalogue down and getting it to the people.
