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A nice German interview from Summer/Fall 2000 to promote "More Light", back then.
http://www.musikdiener.de/ox/interviews
Still a nice read I think, so I translated it. Again, there is the problem to translate J’s words back from German, just hope they still make sense
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HÃœSKER DÃœ, SONIC YOUTH, DINOSAUR JR – that was my musical tri-star of US guitar rock in the mid-eighties. The first ones vanished a long time ago, the second disappeared out of my perception at the beginning of the nineties, and DINOSAUR JR. are also history. But J Mascis, their solitary head, starts with his current solo record exactly at the point, where DINOSAUR JR stopped. I met the man, who doesn’t like interviews at all, in Cologne. And look, he talked nevertheless – after his girlfriend, who is from Berlin, told me not to take his silence personal. It’s just the way he is …
Q.: The eighties were according to my opinion a time, when guitar music, in the way you play it, had its absolute high time, while since then electronic music is substantially on an increase. How do you see that?
A.: "For me the situation in the USA doesn’t look so much like the electronic music is succeeding, rather than that people are generally less interested in music. And then you must separate clearly between things such as Britney Spears and LIMP BIZKIT at the top and people like me at the bottom – and there isn’t anything left in between anymore. On the other hand, at the time when we began to make music, it wasn’t differently. People hated us. We were kids, who felt the urge to make music, why ever, because we didn’t have any fans. We became nevertheless gradually more and more popular then somehow. At some time the thing reached its peak and then it went back again."
Q.: How does it feel to become better and better musically on the one hand, but on the other hand the commercial success rather diminishes, because the public has decided to prefer different music, styles and bands?
A.: "That depends on the person, I think. But of course each musician prefers to be well-known and successful than less well-known and less successful. That again has something to do with the reasons, why one makes music."
Q.: And why do you make music?
A.: "because I like music and rather like to play music, I want to listen to. It’s still possible to do it, so I’m doing it."
Q.: How important is music your life? Does it take most of your time or is it something, what you’re dealing with periodically?
A.: "music is very important for me and takes the very most of my time. I constantly think about certain sounds and music, and if not, I think about my studio and new equipment. Or I make music together with friends. My house is full with instruments and equipment. My whole life consists of music."
Q.: Do you collect instruments, valuable equipment, or do you have those, which just accumulated?
A.: "I don’t really collect them, I like old instruments simply because of their sound and don’t buy them, in order to put them in show cases. Apart from that, old guitars, which were repaired, are cheaper than new ones – and they have a history, they have been played. I’m really interested in the sound, not in the value of a guitar."
Q.: How do you work in the studio? Are you a supporter of analog technique or do you also work digitally?
A.: "I prefer analog recordings, it simply sounds better. And that’s easy to prove, if someone doubts: I play both, the analog and the the digital recording and then everything is clear. But I also use digital equipment, sometimes it’s simply much more comfortable. And if it would sound better digitally, I would work digitally. That is not a question of faith for me, but only about what sounds better. Each technician and physicist, who understands something of his subject, can explain to you exactly, why analog sounds better than digital. Digital technique is based on the principle of the reduction, there is always something missing. Unfortunately there are too many people, who believe meanwhile, that digital recordings sound better than analog. Further it’s simply more fun to work with analog tapes than with hard disks. There you have these large coils, which you can really touch, and not only a file in the computer – that’s no fun."
Q.: Do you try to make sure that your music is published always also on vinyl?
A.: "I try it, yes. At the time when I had the major deal, they didn’t want to release "Green Mind" on vinyl in the USA and I went really mad. I still buy much vinyl, myself, it’s simply more fun with it. And most the things I want to buy still come out on vinyl."
Q.: Wich records did you buy lately?
A.: "ahm.. … sorry, can’t really remember right now. Generally I like many things of the Matador label, and these things are all available on vinyl. And Rap also almost always comes out on vinyl, while I don’t like much Rap, but rather the extreme things. For instance, the old recordings of Ol’ Dirty bastard, these are simply just ill and beyond of good and bad."
Q.: How do you face the present developments around music in the internet, the availability of your records via file sharing platforms or as official mp3-files?
A.: "Oh, somehow I don’t really care. No, it hasn’t got anything to do with my life. I don’t waste time to download music somewhere and I don’t care either, if people download my things. Generally, I don’t think it’s a bad thing and I don’t understand, why METALLICA are so upset about it. Up to then I always thought, they were quite ok."
Q.: Do you use the computer and the Internet or do you refuse to use that?
A.: "no, I have a computer, not very long, though. And I was also immediately inspired by the technology of email and also the idea to buy things over the internet. You can find the strangest things there. I even already offered some things on eBay, but I hate it to mess around with the people who want to buy things from me. These people are crazy and get on your nerves."
Q.: And what is with these DINOSAUR JR things, with test pressings? I know that many musicians still make good money with them.
A.: "that’s is not my pair of shoes. But there’s a good story about it: The bassist of PAVEMENT sold the first NIRVANA single for $500 – and then someone told him that he sold it for $900 the week before. I said then to him, he should have written in addition, who he is, that would have surely pushed the price. And do you know what? I bought this single also back then, also in same record shop. And wat do I do? I forgot it the same evening on a party. I had it just for a few hours… "
Q.: What constitutes the typical J Mascis guitar sound?
A.: "I have no idea, it simply comes out of these hands that way. Further, many guitarists play very different things, while I always actually play the same."
Q.: The last DINOSAUR JR album came out 1997. Now you’ve released a solo album – where are the differences? I mean, the record doesn’t actually sound differently than a new DINOSAUR JR album would probably have sounded.
A.: "Haha, there aren’t any differences!"
Q.: Why then the discontinuity?
A.: "I felt like it. It was time for a change. I wanted to get my head free and get rid of obligations, and as I see it, it has been the right decision."
Q.: I remember an interview with you before a few years, where you confessed that you’re an inspired golf player. Is golf still your hobby, nowadays?
A.: "Oh, I play it just occasionally. In the USA it’s completely different than in Germany. Iit’s very popular and widespread here, like bowling or billard. You have soccer, so … But I am not particularly a good golf player. And to be a good golf player is more difficult than to be a good musician. To be really good, you must concentrate very much, get completely involved in it. Everyone can make music, thus. In golf you win or you lose, no space for interpretations, only black and white."
Q.: How do you start the songwritig?
A.: "I simply play around on the guitar or on the piano, and if I’m in the right mood, there are some good results."
Q.: With whom did you co-operate lately?
A.: "on the new album with Kevin Shields of MY BLOODY VALENTINE. He lived for two months with me in my house, he helped me with the photographs, he also played on some tracks. That was it. Now I try to arrange a new band, and it looks like Mike Watt will play the bass. The thing will run under the name J Mascis & The Fog."
Q.: What’s the difference about recording an album completely at home in the own studio compared to a large studio in another city?
A.: "Above all, it means not to be under pressure financially and with the time. At the moment I couldn’t imagine to record in a "normal" studio. Besides of that, it’s easier to record things with a band: you practice first, go into the studio and record. Compared with that I never had completely finished songs, but I recorded them to see how things develop. In addition it just feels good to have your own studio: Ten years ago, I wouldn’t have dared to dream of it. Further it became increasingly harder for me during the last years to work in a foreign studio: I often sat only there and stared out of the window, incapable to work creatively on something – and that was for $1.000 a day."
Q.: In Europe your record is released by City Slang – what about the US?
A.: "I’m on Ultimatum there, a label, that I didn’t know before, myself. They went recently together with another label, and they have DOG STAR, the band of Keanu Reeves, hahaha.
[:aliensmile:; FC] I know City Slang for quite a while, and my girlfriend is from Berlin and knows the City Slang people for a long time. I sent them a tape, they liked it, and that was it."J, I thank you for the interview.
Joachim HillerQuote:And then you must separate clearly between things such as Britney Spears and LIMP BIZKIT at the top and people like me at the bottomShouldn’t that be the other way around?????
:aliensmile:Thanks again for the translation FC, nice read!
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