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One of the Elephant Six Collective’s flagship acts, Elf Power have steadily released albums since the late '90s, eventually infusing their psych-pop song craft with a sturdy dose of big T. Rex glam guitars and enough classic rock oomph to derail any notion that the band will ever get stuck on just one style. Lead singer Andrew Rieger chatted with Austinist via email about the band’s new album, collaborations with other artists, and what’s been going on creatively in Athens, Georgia, the city this band calls home.
Elf Power have a new album called In a Cave coming out shortly after SXSW, and rumor has it's a little more like the lo-fi freakiness of (Elf Power’s 1997 album) When the Red King Comes than 2006's psych-folk Back to the Web. True, or a complete lie?
The new record incorporates lots of different elements and feels – it’s a very diverse record...there are both moments of lo-fi freakiness and moments of folk rock. Eric
Harris (drummer/multi instrumentalist, formerly of Olivia Tremor Control) co-wrote some of the songs with me, where he wrote the music and I wrote the vocal melodies and lyrics, which was a new experience for me. Those songs turned out really amazing and really different from anything Elf Power has ever done before.
Aside from just the band name, Elf Power has quite a few songs with Sci-Fi/space themes, it seems, like "Window to Mars" and "The Demon's Daughter" on the new one. Are you guys heavy into Tolkien, 2001and all that stuff?
2001 is actually one of my favorite films, but there’s not really much supernatural imagery on this record. "Window to Mars" gets its title from a lyric in the song about staring at the stars and planets in the night sky, and "Demon's Daughter" was mostly born out of dream imagery.
Your friends in of Montreal, including former Elf Power guitarist Bryan Poole, stepped into some controversy when they began doing advertisements. Do you have any big plans for Elf Power's chance at scoring a commercial, or some commentary about going mainstream with your music?
No, no plans to do a commercial at this time.
The Orange Twin conservation community is 150 acres of land located 5 miles outside of Athens. It's a former Girl Scout camp. 100 acres will be preserved and homes will be built on the other part of the land. There's currently a large group house out there where a bunch of folks are living. We also have big concerts out there every now and again at a natural amphitheater in the woods. We've had Bonnie Prince Billy, Olivia Tremor Control, Tall Dwarfs. The record label Orange Twin has released records from Neutral Milk Hotel, Elf Power, and re-issues of old forgotten records from the 1960s and '70s like Elyse and Sibylle Baier’s Colour Green. In 2008 we will release records from the Instruments, Nana Grizol, and a collaboration between Vic Chesnutt and Elf Power.
Speaking of which, what was it like working with Vic Chesnutt?
It was great, we recorded the record at Vic's house in his attic studio over the course of a year. We’d go over and Vic would teach us a song, we'd work up an arrangement, record it live and move on. It sounds amazing. It'll probably be out in the summer or fall.
While some members in Elf Power are also involved in seemingly hundreds of other projects, you, Mr. Rieger, seem solely focused on Elf Power. What else keeps you busy, and do you have any secret projects you'd like to come clean about?
Elf power takes up a lot of my time, the writing keeps me busy. I do have a few noise bands in Athens that I play in from time to time like Howling Jelly and Vortex of Withering.
Elf Power: [official] [myspace]
Elf Power will be playing SXSW on March 12th at Spiro's.
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