Joe Pernice

Joe Pernice isn’t a novice at making music. Rather, he’s one of the rare artists with longevity, a devoted following, and his own record label, Ashmont Records. Pernice has released a steady stream of albums since the ’90s (including his early work with Scud Mountain Boys), but it’s been nearly four years since the last proper Pernice Brothers album — 2006’s criminally appealing Live a Little.

Pernice, however, hasn’t been dormant. In that span he released a novel, It Feels So Good When I Stop, and an accompanying soundtrack of covers with the same name. He’s an artist who’s so talented, it’s a little sickening — though I’m certain he might never admit to such — and his multitude of releases demonstrate a mixture of styles, each one more impressive than the previous.

He spoke with Stereo Subversion recently about the new Pernice Brothers record, Goodbye, Killer, the process of writing fiction vs. writing music, and why it is that he really does love the stage. Oh, and also why he dislikes cymbals.

SSv: The new record feels a little looser, freer. Did you feel you were at the point where you could do what you wanted to?

Joe: Well, I’ve always felt like that. It’s definitely more chilled out, though — the recording process. There were no real financial constraints this time. It costs a lot of money to record a record, paying for daily rates and stuff like that. And even in the past we’ve known people who have been very kind, studio-owners who are very cool about cutting us a break because we’re a small label that doesn’t have a ton of money. But even in those situations you feel like you’re working against the clock and working against a budget.

So, with this record, I think right around the time my brother [Bob Pernice] and I started recording the covers record I did for my book [It Feels So Good When I Stop], we just started buying more equipment and gear and my brother — who’s a pretty good engineer — started spending more time engineering and got his chops really up. And so we got a studio, made the covers record, and it was an easy record to make because it gave him an opportunity to see if it was something he could pull off.

We realized we could do a full record, an original record by ourselves. So we bought more gear and, long story short, we had no constraints on doing takes over and over or scrapping whole tunes. I did stuff on this record that honestly I never really did before. We would finish a song and say, “You know what? Let’s do it again from top to bottom.”

I don’t think I’ve done that on any other record. In the past I would do a song and either scrap it and it disappeared for good or I just kept it with the imperfections because you didn’t have the time or the money to do it again. This time it was like, “Screw it, let’s just start over again.”

SSv: A lot of bands have a “first-take, best-take” attitude — especially now. Did that freedom to scrap entire songs help out your writing or recording of this album at all?

Joe: At first it was a little unnerving because I’m not used to doing that. First, I would think, “Shit. We did all that work on this tune. Is it just not cutting it or could we do it a different way?” It was something I wasn’t used to. But you step back and remind yourself, that you are the record label. I don’t have to put this record out for five years if I don’t want to. I don’t even have to put it out ever! Let’s just record it. Who cares? Let’s see what comes out of it. It was pretty liberating in a way, in the end. But I had to remind myself that there were no deadlines. I’m the only one I have to please.

And this time the players on the record — James Walbourne, and Ric Menck — those guys were just really… I played with James for years now and played with Menck on and off. I don’t think we’ve ever recorded together before this. He toured with me for a bit and he’s a good friend. And we just had a really good vibe; really low-key and easy. Not that the other band members I’ve played with before aren’t, it’s just different is all.

SSv: At this point you’ve got a big catalog of albums. Where does this one rank in terms of your favorite — or do you have a favorite?

Joe: It’s such a different experience that it was almost like a new band because James was recording in this record in a capacity that he hadn’t in the past. In the past, he played a lot of piano and keys. He played guitar but Peyton [Pinkerton] was always the main guitar player and I think James was always wary of not getting in his way because Peyton has played with me since the beginning.

On this record James was free to do anything he wanted on all the songs — whether it was guitar, keys, or who knows what. So he was able to run wild. But because the experience was so different, it’s definitely one of my favorite records. I love the sound of it; it’s open. There aren’t a ton of instruments. And I love the vocal sounds on this record — this could be my favorite vocal-sounding record, I’ve done to be honest with you.

SSv: I noticed that there weren’t a lot of instruments, too, but the instruments that are there are wholly essential to the song. There’s not a missed instrument.

Joe: Yeah, I don’t think so. And we were very aware of that and didn’t want to clutter it up. There was a couple times where we would say, “Oh, let’s try doubling this guitar.” And it was almost unanimous, everyone would say, “Why? It doesn’t need it. Why clutter it up?”  And I don’t know if you noticed but there’s not a single drum-fill on the record. Not one.

SSv: I didn’t notice that but I did notice there were a few more guitar solos.

Joe: There’s not a cymbal either. There’s a hi-hat but no cymbals. I don’t like cymbals in music, in recording. Because I think part of that is the openness of this record — which, to my ears, is purely a taste thing. I think cymbals just suck up guitars and high-ends. I can’t stand them to be honest with you. It’s like AC/DC’s, Back In Black. When you listen to “You Shook Me” or “Back In Black,” there’s no drum-fill in there, it’s just kick and snare — there’s no toms, either.

SSv: Keeping in the classis rock vein, I always felt like when John Bonham didn’t throw a drum-fill into a song, it was the best he played. You know, when he would just lay down a beat.

Joe: It’s an easy thing to say — and even a cool thing to say, “Oh, when he didn’t play it was so musical,” but it’s true! When you hear it once and you don’t even notice it and you go back and discover it again and you hear it in a different way. To my ears, it allows other instruments that might have to compete with that to deliver in a way that you would hope that they can. You know?

SSv: Well, there are a lot of instruments on track three, “We Love the Stage,” which is a bit different from some of the rest of the songs, but in a great way–

Joe: Yeah, I dig that one, too.

SSv: Well, how much of that song is autobiographical? How much of it really sums up how you feel about “the stage”?

Joe: Well, I do enjoy playing [live] that’s for sure. We always joke about it but we’ve been at this a long time. You’ll be playing some crummy club here or there and schlepping around — which is fine, that’s the life we chose. James and I always joke. I’ll say, “This is the life we chose, James,” and he’ll say, “This is the life that chose us.”

But we’ll be — I don’t even know — in some grim club in Detroit or somewhere like that — and it’s very… Playing music has a very weird magnetism obviously, especially for someone who’s been doing it 13 records deep, you know? And I know what I’m talking about; I’m not just some guy who just started making records last week and was shooting for stardom. It’s a different kind of thing when you know who you are and you know what kind of music you make and you just do it. It has its down moments and it’s not super glamorous. But when it’s good, there’s nothing like it. And when it’s bad, there’s nothing like it. [Laughs]

SSv: So last year your book came out and the covers record came out with it, and I wanted to ask you as a fiction writer and a musician, is it difficult to keep those two styles separate?

Joe: It was really easy to keep them separate. When I started to write the book, when it became obvious that I was going to do it and sign a deal with Penguin [Publishers], I honestly said, “The day I sign the contract, wherever I am with music, I’m putting it on hold.” So, that was really easy to do. That’s why this album took so long to come out. We started making it but then I had to stop to stick to my original plan. I just pulled the plug on this record until the book was done.

So it was easy to separate the two things and I wrote no songs — for the first time in my life I might have gone weeks without playing guitar. So it was easy to do. It was only when I got into the writing of the book that the musician in me would creep up and the idea to record an album of the songs [in the novel] came about. As soon as I submitted the manuscript, that’s when we recorded the covers record.

For me it became really easy because I had made 10 or 11 records up to that point and had toured pretty consistently and my wife and I had a kid right before I started. And I’m a pretty disciplined guy, usually. And I knew I didn’t have a lot of time to screw around; I didn’t have a lot of hours in the day so I had to choose one or the other. But I bet you, if I was single, and I had a record and book going at the same time, I’d still be working on both of them. I find it easier to do one thing at a time.

SSv: [Laughs] Yeah, me too.

Joe: Because they’re not the same thing, you know? Writing songs and recording songs is easy. Any day I can just go into it and get into the mindset and be in the zone. But writing fiction or prose, that takes a lot of activation energy — at least for me. It takes a long time to get your chops up on that or get into a groove — especially when you’re working on something that is going to be 60 or 70,000 words. You’re not talking about a two minute song, you’re talking about sustaining a world — not just a glimpse of a life.

SSv: Do you think that’s why there aren’t as many “writers” in the music industry, because it is so difficult to sustain ideas and worlds past a two minute song?

Joe: I’m sure there are a lot more than we think. But I don’t really know why. If you’re a musician, unless you’re an “unknown,” it’s easier I think… Actually I don’t know what I’m talking about [Laughs]. I don’t know why.

But, like I said, the thing about writing fiction is that it takes a long time to get into the groove of it all. And I think if you love the process — which you had better — I think it takes a longer time for the process to feed you. As a musician, I could go home right now and start working on a song and I bet you within 15 minutes I’m gonna stumble upon an idea. Not a song, but a chord change or a progression or a melody that’s going to spark me. And then I have something to go on.

The payoff from the process of making music is much more immediate, much more instantaneously gratifying than writing fiction and prose. And it’s much easier to get into the groove of playing music than writing fiction. Because every day for four or five hours straight you gotta put your ass in that seat for however long you work to keep your pace up. Writing music you can check in and out — 20 minutes here an hour or so there. It’s easier to do, I think.

SSv: So what’s the status on the screenplay for The Smith’s novella you wrote for the 33 1/3 series?

Joe: Oh, I don’t know. We’ve gone through drafts and drafts. I don’t know what’s happening with that. I’ve got so many other projects going on now… I just don’t know. I just laugh about it because it’s grown so many heads, it’s like a hydra. You’ll be asking me that question in 10 years probably. What happened, I guess, is that it evolved into something different than the book.

SSv: So what other projects are you working on?

Joe: I’m going to do some more recording and I’m starting a new book. I’m working on pitching a couple of television shows, actually. So, I got a few things cooking.

SSv: Staying busy then.

Joe: Yeah, but I should be busier. Because I don’t go to work 9 to 5 I always feel like if I’m not doing something between those hours then I’m just being a sack. Normal people are out there busting their balls all day.

*Photo by Mike Ritter

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