With each passing year, White Denim turns a new stone, venturing into musical paths and waters that extend the broad scope of their psychedelic rock sound. From their roots as a three piece garage-y punk outfit, the now four member band (Jenkins joined White Denim as a fulltime member in August of 2010) has since taken on a jammier, progressive direction that explores a more composed sound, built up by intricately composed songs ripe with varying time signatures and extended measures of guitar acrobatics. Over the last five years, the amazingly prolific group has put out five LPs and an equal number of EPs. In May of 2011, they released the prog-aligned D, followed by the starkly contrasting Takes Place In Your Workspace EP, their mellowest effort to date. We caught up with White Denim bassist Steve Trebecki and guitarist Austin Jenkins recently to chat about their current direction, appearances on the summer festival circuit, and some new projects in the works. The group is rounded out by drummer Joshua Block and guitarist/vocalist James Petralli.
All of White Denim’s albums have followed a major progression with each new release sounding far different from the previous one. What has inspired the band’s current direction?
ST: The main thing that jumps to my mind is that our first three records were recorded in Josh’s home studio, so there’s a lot of limitations there. Also, endless amounts of time. Whereas starting with D and then Takes Place In Your Workspace, we’ve been working in outside studios with not a lot of limitations as far as the gear goes, but also limited time. I think that’s the main thing, but also just each of us growing as musicians as wanting to explore different types of music.
AJ: Ideally, the concept generally revolves around something centralized that we’re getting excited about doing and then executing a recording project that has that in mind. The two tunes that we’re going to be adding to the Takes Place in Your Workspace EP, we’re trying to make sure they fit in with the material that’s there already and just working them into a direction that that had. As far as direction for the EP, James had these tunes written and just getting in there and trying to serve the song in a way and trying to incorporate a lot these elements that weren’t quite exposed on D.
Were the EP and D recorded around the same time or were those different sessions?
ST: There’s a couple of songs on Takes Place that were intended to be on D. Then there’s a couple of songs that we recorded in a session last Februrary. So it’s kind of half and half as far as Takes Place goes. The two songs we’re adding were also recorded in those February sessions, along with “Cat City” and “No Real Reason.”
Do you feel the EP is more representative of your sound right now?
ST: Well that’s maybe why it ended up as an EP. We had these tunes that sounded in that way that didn’t fit on D. We have a lot of other songs that didn’t fit on D, which we’ll probably be making future EPs with. We just try to put songs in a collection that sounds good together. It wouldn’t necessarily mean it’s our current direction, we’re just trying to find a place that makes sense for all of the songs.
AJ: I think it’s a difficult thing to establish a timeline of direction, because, in a way, we sort of have many directions at one time. It’s just what we’re currently working on and having continuality and making sure that happens. That process will form what direction we get in, but I agree with Steve, it’s just trying to make sure the material all fits together as one unit when you hear it.
Many of the songs are almost prog-rock leaning. Are you guys writing these collaboratively or are they written individually?
ST: Well for D, I think almost all of them were demos that James had guitar and vocals on—maybe on additional instrument. He sort of just sent them to us and we worked our own instruments into them. The one song, “Drug,” was a little different as far as that goes. But D was mostly James’ songs.
AJ: Many of the ideas start with James coming up with things. I think one of the ways he likes to write is with his acoustic guitar on his front porch. He generates a whole lot of songs and ideas from those things and sessions that he does. He then shows them to the group and we start trying to hammer them out and doing different sections. That’s how the process develops in a large majority.
How do you feel the addition of a second guitarist, Austin, has changed the group’s sound both on and off stage?
ST: We’ve always had so many parts that weren’t represented in our older tunes. Working with Austin in the studio has been really great, he’s just onboard with us artistically. James used to use a boomerang pedal and loop parts and he’d have to be totally focused on guitar playing and singing. Now he doesn’t have to be as focused on guitar playing, he can really take over the vocal duties fully and Austin can take on guitar fully. James can play guitar and not necessarily show that he’s having to fill something up because Austin’s got it.
Hearing about your live show is how I was hipped onto White Denim—it’s known to be a very powerful performance with tons of energy. How do you approach the live show, are you playing the songs how they are on the album or do you improvise and let the songs wander in their own directions?
ST: I think a lot of D is very similar to the album. Some of the older tunes, we have sort of a different arrangement for them. There’s very little improvising at all. I’d say the structure of most tunes, for the most part, stay the same. There may be some variation within that structure, but there’s no parts where we just vamp and jam or new parts that happen—maybe just variations that happen within the framework.
AJ: One of the tunes we’ve been having fun with lately is at the end of the tune “River Consider.” Instead of doing this triplet oriented feel, to take it out we’ve just been going with the groove. The structure is still there, the link is to be determined by that, but I don’t know that it’s improvising. We’ll get freer with some solo sections and maybe some grooves, but I think overall the form is there. One thing that we really enjoy doing live is tying a lot of music together thematically and appreciating how certain tempos or rhythms will work with each other. So we’ll try to tie these anthems or huge medleys together and it’s cool to be conscious of that. I feel that it’s improvising in the sense that it’s creating a new composition on top of what we’re doing, but maybe it’s more just trying to make a larger composition out of littler ones.
What festivals are you playing this summer and which are you most looking forward to?
ST: We’re playing Primavera, Bonnaroo and Hopfarm in England, Hobo festival in Norway, Hipathon and Outlands. I’m really excited about Hopfarm—they just released the lineup and I think Bob Dylan and the Stranglers are playing. I’m really excited about all of them, they all kind of have their own charm going on. We haven’t really played any of them.
What are some of the goals you’re setting for yourselves this summer?
ST: We’re going to bring some recording equipment and mics on the road with us to try and finish some ideas off. We’re touring through the summer—pretty much until mid August—playing a lot and developing ideas.
AJ: We have some ideas for some tunes and some touchstones, but nothing concrete at this point.
