The Cave Singers Love Rice Wine & Seattle: An Interview

photo of The Cave Singers from band facebook

Editor's Note: This awesome interview was contributed by guest writer and aspiring music journalist Ruth Griffin.

You'd think making music in your basement would be the first step towards a successful music career. Some, though, consider it to be the only step, and embrace the underground haven. It was with this attitude that our friends, The Cave Singers, were born. In spite of their title, these fellas stray far from any cave-like bounds, captivating listeners with raw, sincere vocals, and an infectious folk-rock sound. More recently, these Seattle-based boys have been making waves with their third LP, No Witch, welcoming a new record label as well as a completely booked tour schedule. And with a Friday afternoon ACL performance right around the corner, the Singers’ guitarist/bassist Derek Fudesco took some time off to answer some questions about music, the break from Matador, and tabletop dancing in China.

You guys have been playing a lot of festivals lately, and you’ve got a lot more upcoming, including ACL, which we're all excited for. And I was just curious how you guys like playing live festivals versus playing shows on the leg of a tour?

They’re so different. Festivals, it’s no sound check. Just get up and play. Honestly, I prefer to play, just like regular shows, but I mean, festivals are super fun ‘cause you also—it’s nice when you can see, like, bands you like playing all over, versus like just one or two you're on tour with.

Yeah, that makes sense. Who’s been some fun bands you've seen at festivals so far?

We played—there’s this festival, it’s like a smaller festival, in Seattle called the Block Party, and we saw Kurt Vile play that, which was really awesome. I mean, Green Man—we just played a festival in the UK, and we saw Explosions in the Sky and this band, the Sic Alps. They were good.

A lot of these are just bands that we normally would miss when they come to Seattle ‘cause we're on tour, so it’s cool to be able to see them.

How was the transition from creating and contributing to a, forgive my lack of genre specificity, punk-ish sound, in Pretty Girls Make Graves, to a more mellow, laid back, folk style, like the Cave Singers have?

There really wasn’t any kind of transition (laughs). It’s just writing with different people and playing with different people.

It's the same you know. I write music, guitar lines or bass lines and then Pete or Andrea, they both write the vocal. It wasn't really different, the bands are totally different style bands but it's the same. It's just like playing music with friends.

What's your take on all of these sub-divisions of genres in music today?

Honestly, I don't pay attention to it.

That's a big no.

If a band sounds good, it is good. I am an old man. I don't pay attention to scenes or genres. If it touches me in a way where I want to learn more about it and listen to it, then I just go with it. I could give a shit about labels or any of that.

It gets pretty complex.

It is unnecessarily complex.

Exactly. So you could just say that, the genre that you like is just "awesome," that’s the genre it is in.

Yeah, the genre of awesome. That is what I want to be a part of and what I want to listen to.

Alright, so you guys got together in Seattle, and when I think about Seattle, I think about this strange duality. You've got the big rain soaked city coupled with the really beautiful forests and greenery and your band’s style, to me, is almost rustic and almost picturesque at times, with very vivid imagery, both dark and light imagery. What aspects of Seattle and living in Seattle, if any, have filtered in to the aesthetic of your music style and the vibe?

It's weird, I really love this city, and you're right, it is different as far as it has a darkness. For us it's, I notice when we write songs in the summertime versus when we write songs in the winter time, it's kind of different what comes out. I know it's ridiculous to talk about weather, you know, you've got like three months of rain and it's gray outside, it can affect you a little bit and it seeps into everything you do. So naturally the songs, the song writing, would come out on the darker side of things. But we have the best summers. It is just warm enough to swim and it's never uncomfortable, it is just beautiful. The city in the summer is amazing.

I think I hate you right now. It is so hot in Texas right now. I'm jealous.

Wait, is it still going to be hot?

For ACL, I think you’re going to have to experience that for yourself and then you'll want to flee back to Seattle and you'll be like, 'I love my summers', again. So your new album No Witch, came out in February on Jagjaguwar records, whereas your previous two LPs came out on Matador Records. I was wondering what compelled you guys to switch labels?

It was kinda…I don't know. It was time to move on. We didn't really care to work with them anymore and they didn't really care to work with us anymore and it was just, you know, there was a minute there where we were like, “well maybe we should just put on our own record,” but we really like Jag and the label a lot and we have friends on the label, they had always said really good things. So we presented it, “We would like to do a record with you...” and they eventually asked us.

And aside from being tired of Matador Records, how did the switch affect the outcome of No Witch?

I couldn’t tell you. I mean, I know that we definitely, like… there was more pressure on this record. I mean, this record had more of a presence than the previous two did.

As far as the business side of things, it’s been a real pleasure to work with everyone at Jag. Like, they’re really straight up and honest and hardworking. So, it’s been really neat, you know?

No Witch

I’m also curious, randomly, what’s going on in the album art for No Witch? It kind of looks like a dude screwing in a light bulb, but I would love to know who that lovely model is.

That’s Pete, the singer. I took the picture. We recently did... well, not recently, but we did a tour in China, and it was amazing and totally insane and that picture was taken after some heavy drinking of rice wine after being there for like a week, and kind of just going crazy. And he was… he was on top of the table. He was just on a table dancing and I just started taking pictures and while we were looking at art, that picture came up, and you know, it was what we thought might represent this batch of songs pretty well.

I was recently watching the adventurous music video for “Black Leaf,” and I was just wondering how involved you guys were in making that video?

We actually weren’t that involved at all. I mean, Sam [Macon, the video’s director] is a friend of ours and [he] had the idea. We had been talking with him about working on our videos for a while, and we were on tour and he presented us with a street myth for it and we all liked it. So, we got together with some awesome people from Milwaukee and from Chicago and they shot it and sent it to us.

Yeah, I was wondering if you guys had like, childhood fantasies of running through the forest and vanquishing cardboard monsters.

(Laughs) That’s pretty good.

You were here for South By, and now you guys are coming back to Austin. You guys must really love Austin, huh?

Austin’s amazing.

How’d you like South By Southwest this year?

It’s fun. We talk about this a lot, like, trying to schedule a tour where we come to Austin where it’s not South By Southwest. For some reason, it seems like, that’s mostly when we play there and the city is just way too hectic.

So, what bands are you looking forward to seeing at ACL if you get a chance?

Honestly, I haven’t had a chance to look at the lineup.

Well, you should! There’s some good people…

I know, I’m gonna. We’ve been super busy and we just got home. Just now, it’s starting to sink in (laughs), like everything that we have coming up, so I’m just excited to look and see who’s playing our day.