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The Constant Awareness That I’m Alive: A Conversation with Singer-Songwriter Jonathan Facka

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A few months ago while working on a music video for Richmond, VA based singer-songwriter Jonathan Facka and his song ‘The Tarmac‘, I got to know the guy and his music. RVA Magazine has covered him before but I found both interesting enough to ask for an interview. Dark, moody, self deprecating, but very funny and engaging at the same time; that is Jonathan, and this is our conversation.

If you get a moment check out his album, also called The Tarmac, on Spotify and the music video we created together HERE. Its all really good stuff.

Jonathan Facka: My name is Jonathan Facka. I’m a singer songwriter from Richmond, Virginia, born at MCV and in 2015 moved to Arizona — I was there for about a year and then I came back. I played clarinet in middle school, and then I transitioned to guitar class in high school. And I just liked it. I didn’t write a real serious song until I was about 27, surprisingly. Basically, a bunch of tragedy happened and I didn’t know I had anything to write about until that. Better late than never.

R. Anthony Harris: So your newest album is out, and has been out there. What is the inspiration for the album? There is a lot of emotion in there and you can tell there is tragedy, sadness, loss.

JF: Sure. Well, I wrote ‘The Tarmac’ and I had a collection of other songs, then it just turned out to be an aviation theme. I’m kind of afraid of flying on airplanes. So I met a guy who asked me to write a song for his wedding. It was called ‘The Terminal,’ another aviation theme, and the theme just started coming together.

Whenever you write an album, I think it’s important to tie them together in some way. Now, everyone’s focused on singles, but there’s an art to making an entire album, and I don’t want to see that go away. So I like making albums.

RAH: What is it about your fear of flying that influenced this album, or is it just fear in general?

photo by Kimberly Frost @kimberlyfrost

JF: It’s just claustrophobia, this constant awareness that I’m alive, thinking about it. I walk around thinking about my breath — thinking, I could drop dead at any minute. That’s all I ever really think about, and it’s crazy. So just thinking about getting on a plane, I’m like, I’m out of control.

But yeah, the whole theme of ‘The Tarmac’ in general was once you leave the tarmac there’s no turning back, and sometimes you’re on a set path and there’s nothing you can really do. So you got to let Jesus take the wheel, you know? Did I answer the question? (laughs)

RAH: Well there’s a feeling of anxiety in ‘The Tarmac’ and having to make big decisions and maybe not being able to make them, or never making them. Are all the other songs reflective of that theme? How does the record move from the beginning to the end?

JF: So it starts off pretty fast paced, that’s how I started the first record, and it builds to a full band format by the second song — to show what the album has evolved to, because I didn’t have drums on my previous record. I introduced the cello this time around too. Then it moves into the terminal theme and I just kind of keep it going. Even in the first song, there’s a lyric that I’ve been locked in ‘tubes in the sky,’ it’s just a little nod to airplanes. It’s really loose, because I put the theme together late, but it works.

So it gets really sad at one point, then a little bit more hopeful, and I just kind of ended the album like The Sopranos, just black screen — just ended it in the middle of a phrase. I liked that ending. The audacity of that ending was incredible and I wanted to do something like that, because I thought it was impressive.

RAH: You had mentioned a number of Easter eggs in the album. We just talked about your love of Final Fantasy VII. What other Easter eggs are there? Do you want to disclose any of those?

JF: Okay, so really the only real Easter egg was in ‘Anew.’ I had the cello play the ‘Tifa’s Theme‘ behind the song in the beginning, because I like Final Fantasy so much.

As far as an obvious Easter egg, there was my father’s voicemails that I released to the public. I thought it would be really cool — because you know, (pause) he’s dead — to put his voice on my album and have him live on in that way. There’s something immortal about making music.

So I wanted to solidify his voice wherever, because he’s gone. (pause) My family didn’t know I had those. So, surprise! They were the voicemails that he had left me a couple days before he died. Those are real voicemails. Somebody asked me, what, did you just get some stock voicemails, or something like that? That’s really him. I had Google Voice and I logged into it last year, and there they were. I was like okay, I gotta send these to my producer, we got to put them on the album as a tribute to him. And the song is called ‘Stone.’ It’s about how I didn’t have enough money to buy him a headstone. So he was just laying in an unmarked grave.

He has one now.

RAH: I don’t know if you want me to ask you this, but I want to bring it up because I think it relates to the album. The story you told me about going to Atlantic City, where you had a little bit of cash…

JF: …and I don’t want to tell people that story. We will leave that off there, actually. I might have a song about Atlantic City, coming out on the next thing.

RAH: Okay, this will just be the teaser to that song.

JF: Sure, I mean, I’ve got some stories still left to tell. It’s just a dark… that’s a really dark story. I think this interview has already gotten kind of dark, you know.

RAH: No, I understand. That story deals a lot with the anxiety and uncertainty and decision making that flows through the album. But we can move on from that. What’s it like being a musician in Richmond?

JF: You know, Richmond has been evolving musically. For the longest time, they used to be like really big with metal. And then the jam bands came along, some ska. They still do, like, the party band thing. But I’m a singer-songwriter, and that didn’t really start being a thing until 2016, 2017 in my opinion — like singer songwriters really weren’t a thing [in Richmond]. But then Forbes Magazine called Richmond the ‘New Nashville.’ You’ll have to probably verify that but it’s what I heard [Editor’s note: Well, sorta, but not in so many words]. And yeah, it’s been nice, but there is still a ways to go for people like me getting the right crowds that will listen to you — they don’t want to just come drink and party and stuff.

So we’re getting that, we’re getting along, but I think I’m on the first wave. It feels like a new thing, the Richmond singer-songwriter. Maybe there was some kind of underground singer-songwriter scene that I wasn’t aware of. I’m sure there were always singer-songwriters and stuff, but I don’t know how long or where. There was a time, when I started in Richmond, there were a bunch of open mics. Then COVID came along and reset everything, and there aren’t any open mics, at least not as many as there were.

I don’t know what affect the open mics had on the growing popularity of singer songwriters in the Richmond scene, but I love it. I love going to an open mic.

photo by Kimberly Frost @kimberlyfrost

RAH: What do you hope people get from the album? To someone who listens to the album, what are you hoping to convey?

JF: I just wanted to make something that people maybe could relate to. Sometimes I feel like my problems might be pretty unique, but if you take a step back and you share your feelings you realize how much your feelings relate to other people, and that you’re not alone. So I think that’s why I’m making music in general. If there’s something I want someone to take from the album, it would probably be — I hope that you relate, in your own way, to my pain.

People ask me why I don’t like happy songs. If I’m listening to a song and someone’s talking about how they got a rose gold watch. I can’t afford that. So that makes me sad. You’re happy because you got a nice watch. But if I hear a guy talking about how sad he is, depending on the circumstance, I can go well at least I’m not that sad, but that makes me happy. So, just because I make sad music does not mean I’m not trying to make people happy. So I guess I want people to feel happy. (laughs)

RAH: (laughs) Perfect Jonathan Facka answer.

Fade to black.

Follow Jonathan Facka on instagram HERE.

Photos by Kimberly Frost

Reverberations Through A Closed Room: Gold Connections Release New Single “Confession”

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Richmond alternative rockers Gold Connections follow up on last fall’s Ammunition EP with a brand new song, “Confession,” which drops today and is sure to get your weekend moving.

Today, Richmond’s Gold Connections are releasing a brand new single, “Confession,” which features Will Evans of Charlottesville’s Stray Fossa, on hi-hat and toms. If you’re out on the road and play this track, you might agree with another local listener’s response: “Nothing wrong with any song that makes you want to get out and move.” Spacey and distinctive indie pop dominates on this meditative love song. Frontman Will Marsh’s lyrics transition from experiencing guilt to connecting with the universe as the music engages in a scattering rhythmic buildup. 

As influences, the band cites postpunk as a genre, and specifically the sounds of Nick Cave and LCD Soundsystem. My tip: listen for the acoustic guitar picking after the intro. I have a favorite memory of a Will Marsh solo acoustic performance in a high-ceilinged 18th century dining hall made of stone walls and plaster. Late afternoon sun lit the three-foot deep window alcoves above my head, and Marsh’s guitar picking slowly built upon the echoes of itself until the air was completely full of music! Listening to “Confession” brings me back to that memory now.

In this intriguing song, guitar is drawn forth along an electric Western-outlaw melody line and absorbed into brassy synth-pop rhythms that take me back to The Naked And Famous. I enjoy a mirage-waves effect of the electric meeting rhythm. A technique mastered so effortlessly by Tame Impala, for example, the strange, transporting effect has a digital quality on this track that does sound like LCD Soundsystem’s, uh, sound system. But the addition of Marsh’s warm, alto vocal tones takes us almost to the doorstep of The National (the band, not the venue). 

Music can try to mimic the reverberations of a closed room to create a feeling of overcoming, rising up, and midway through this vulnerable song, Gold Connections create exactly that mood, as vocal distortions disrupt and suppress the music. Listening becomes a momentarily frustrating experience, and I’m not entirely sure whether the end of the song recovers or finds redemption. On the whole, though, Gold Connections stands out for their expression of warmth and devotion. They have a knack for simplicity.

“Confession” is out today, and you can hear it for yourself on Gold Connections’ digital platforms: their website and Bandcamp page. Happy listening!  

Photo by Phineas Alexander

The Secret World Of the Iron Survivor

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With the soundtrack to a fake movie about the secret world of world-class Rock-Paper-Scissors competitions, Richmond trio Hewolf takes their goofy, theatrical cock-rock to the next level.

“Rock, Paper, Scissors, Shoot!” Get ready to rumble, and get ready to listen to Hewolf’s latest album, Iron Survivor 2: The Motion Picture Soundtrack. This movie-less soundtrack needs no visuals to take you on an adventure through the wild world of underground, high-stakes Rock-Paper-Scissors Competitions. Through the eyes of lonely child Danny Laredo, we get to learn about love, lust, and what it really takes to win it all.

Iron Survivor 2 came out on October 30th, and has generated a buzz among Hewolf fans. The album features six tracks that walk listeners through the most poignant moments of the movie (which again, to be clear, doesn’t actually exist). Listen as Danny gains the confidence to compete, take on his most vicious opponents, and then vanquish them all. 

“[Bassist] Paul [Burnette] was the mastermind of piecing all of that together. Erik and I just kind of came with the ideas and Paul just started putting them all together,” said Johnny Throckmorton, Hewolf’s guitarist. “It’s like a Rubik’s Cube. Erik and I are all the colors, and Paul fits us into solid colors on each side.”

“Every time you listen to it from start to finish it can be a different movie in your head,” said drummer Erik Josephson. “The whole thing was laid in order for different characters, themes, and what’s going on in the movie. It’s a different movie every time you listen to it.”

Though the plot puts young Danny in perilous and serious positions, the guys in Hewolf don’t let that get in their heads when writing out his story. Their comedic take on “cock-rock” and the theatrics of metal bring light to the soundtrack, and help entrench us in the fast paced world that Danny strives every day to bury his stake in.

“We’re serious about our instruments, but everything that follows after that is sarcasm,” said Throckmorton. “The three of us are dads so we’re responsible, we’re punctual, we make sure that we get the job done, but we’re also total goofballs.”

In that endeavor to find the lighter aspect of their music writing, the guys have created a slew of easter-egg moments throughout the entire album. If you listen closely enough you’ll be able to hear impressions of Judas Priest’s Rob Halford, and the lovely sounds of the drunken pub song “Oh Danny Boy.”

“Johnny is the Easter Bunny when it comes to the Easter Eggs,” said Josephson. “In the last song, Johnny does these karate calls.”

“Some of the samples I found were from little pieces on YouTube,” said Burnette. “One of them was from an arm wrestling tournament in Louisiana, and you just hear people yelling random stuff. One guy just yells, ‘go the fuck home!’ right in the beginning.”

Encapsulating all of this in the album is one thing, but as it is a movie soundtrack for a movie that never came out, the door is wide open for the creative pursuit of visual and stage representations. 

“Part of the hope for the soundtrack is that it would spark for someone, and maybe someone would want to make this movie happen,” said Burnette.

“We love playing live, and it’d be fantastic to have the big show with lights, smoke, and pyrotechnics, all the big stuff,” said Throckmorton. “Erik could do a Tommy Lee, we’d put him in a cage and just have him spin around while he’s playing.”

“We’d have a spinning octagon with people playing rock-paper-scissors inside,” replied Josephson.

“We do find some movie company to take this on, and we’ve got three executive producers right here ready to pitch in,” said Burnette.

Even though all of these ideas are just dreams at this point, the band has realized a lot of their ideas in the realm of pure music. Iron Survivor 2 was the second release the band put out during the insane year of 2020. Back in September, Hewolf had already released the Into The Darkness… EP. And now, while everyone is looking forward to playing all of this new music live someday, the biggest thing on their radar now is digging in and writing more music.

“Throughout this process, as much as we want it to go out and play, even if everybody is wearing masks and distancing, we just said we’ll do the smart thing and focus on the music,” said Throckmorton. “We have another six or seven songs we’re working on — we just don’t stop. Now is the time for not only us, but a lot of bands, to kind of push it and start writing stuff.”

Working together on these projects has come naturally to the guys of Hewolf after years of friendship and plenty of experience creating music with other bands. Before the clandestine formation of Hewolf, each of the members were in other bands that toured widely. Burnette was in Darkest Hour and Iron Reagan, Throckmorton was in Alabama Thunder Pussy, Josephson was in HRM, and both Burnette and Josephson were in Crackhead. 

“Johnny and I were in our first band together when we were in high school, and then we were in another band together around 2000,” said Burnette. “Erik and I were in two bands together. We were in a band in like ’93, and another band in the mid ‘90s after that. We’ve all been in bands together and known each other for decades, just had never all played together.”

Now that they’ve joined together for Hewolf, there is no separating them. Each member comes from a similar background and is living in similar circumstances, so their friendship has only gotten stronger over the years. 

“Any time I get opportunities to work with someone else, I always want to bring Paul and Erik into it somehow,” said Throckmorton. “We try to write things about real life, what’s going on. As far-fetched as a rock-paper-scissors tournament is, it could still happen. It’s not a song about dragons and sorcerers.”

“We’re singing about real shit, man,” Josephson chimed in.

“I don’t even miss singing in other bands because it feels so good to be here,” said Throckmorton. “If they said, ‘hey, put your guitar down, you’re going to play the kazoo now. We’re bringing in another guitar player.’ Just as long as I’m here playing with these guys, I’m happy. I’ll play a mean kazoo.”

Growing up in the punk and metal communities brought the guys a great deal of experience they don’t take for granted. Looking back, some of those experiences landed them in places they never thought they’d be, and are glad never to be in again, no matter how fun they were. 

“Darkest Hour got thrown in jail in Oklahoma,” said Burnette. “They hit us with like five different things and threw us all in jail. The band had money to get three of us out and we had to leave the rest of the guys in there until the next day so we could wait for western union the next day at the local Wendy’s. So we got $5,000 wired to us at the Wendy’s, and we still made it to the show in Texas.”

And this wasn’t the only run in with the law; sometimes they even got in trouble in other countries. 

“Our guitar player was having issues, so he [relieved himself in] a bag. He went down to the lower level of the double-decker bus and just was like, ‘What am I gonna do with this?’ Someone suggested to throw it out,” said Burnette. “So he pops open the door of the bus and he’s swinging it, he counts down ‘1…2…’ and as soon as he says ‘3’ there are these Belgian cops coming up alongside the bus going to an accident up ahead, and I swear this bag of hot shit was about three inches from this cop’s nose as he drove by at like 30 mph.”

While all these crazy experiences make for amazing stories and an exciting life, band life wasn’t always this way. Between the many nights of shows, the stops in fun places, and the run-ins with the law, there was plenty of downtime that wasn’t much to write home about. And to the Hewolf guys, that’s okay.

“I wouldn’t change it, but it was definitely hard,” said Throckmorton. “There’s no way I could do it now. We would definitely need the rockstar treatment, have a big bus. Show starts early, ends early — because we’re all dads, and we’re falling asleep by 9 o’clock.”

“With past band experience you can take all that time and boil it all down and it’ll sound like the craziest shit that’s ever happened to somebody. And it really is,” added Burnette. “But before you boil it down, you have this massive amount of downtime — time that’s boring, or wasted, time.”

Something more fulfilling in this season of their lives has cropped up, and that’s fatherhood. The guys of Hewolf have all, at different points in their lives, become dads, and that commonality has helped them build a better routine in their creative life. However, dad life comes with its own ups and downs — ones that may just be as crazy as their former lives.

“Erik is helping take care of his daughter’s cat who had AIDS,” said Burnette.

“Yeah, that was also this week’s gift to me. ‘Dad, I got a cat!’ Okay, great! ‘…and the cat has feline AIDS’,” said Josephson. “I’m looking forward to vet bills on that, that’ll be great.”

Fans of Hewolf’s music might find it surprising that the members’ families aren’t always into what they have going on. However, if you’re a parent, you might not find it surprising at all. The dads of Hewolf have experienced some lackluster responses from their kids, but they know they’re loved regardless. 

“My daughter comes to some shows to support her dad, but it’s not her cup of tea,” said Josephson. “A couple years ago we had a sticker, and her whole car had all the Richmond band stickers on it. So I asked if I could put our sticker on, and she said, ‘No, ugh, you’re my dad.’ But she comes to shows — that is our thing to do.”

“My kid is 14, so the last thing he wants to do is anything to do with what his dad is doing. Whenever he’s ready to hang out, I’m all over it,” said Burnette. “You gotta jump on those moments, because when you’re 14, you want to be with your friends.”

Becoming dads and renewing their commitment to music has given the members of Hewolf new motivation in their work. Now, it’s not about simply being rockstars and having fun; it’s also about their families and using their influence and platform to help others.

One of those outreach platforms the members of Hewolf has been a part of over the years is Punks For Presents, a Richmond based punk non-profit organization that puts on charity shows every year featuring a variety of tribute bands. Through the shows, Punks For Presents raises money to fund donations of presents to children in hospitals and difficult situations during the holidays. In past years, the members of Hewolf have performed at these shows under the pseudonym Elvzig.

“That definitely sums it up — we’re a dad rock band, and you gotta do it for the kids,” said Throckmorton. “If we can help these organizations, or be the theme song to somebody’s really shitty day, that makes us happy. Someone walking down the street who just had a really shitty day and they throw on some Hewolf, then it’s mission accomplished. We are a light in the darkness, and I think it’s pretty awesome.”

Next time you’re feeling down, just imagine yourself winning the ultimate title at a rock-paper-scissors competition. And remember what this message from Hewolf: “Rock always wins.”

To find Iron Survivor 2: The Motion Picture Soundtrack, visit Hewolf’s Bandcamp page. Hewolf also encourages you to check out the Punks For Presents shop, at punksforpresents.storenvy.com. 

Photos via Hewolf/Facebook; Iron Survivor 2 artwork courtesy Hewolf

We Haven’t Had Quite Enough of Deau Eyes

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Capping off a difficult year that saw the release of their debut album, Deau Eyes followed up Let It Leave with surprise single “Haven’t You Had Quite Enough,” a collaboration with DJ Harrison that takes a musical stand against the oppressive negativity of America in 2020.

Deau Eyes, better known as Ali Thibodeau, exudes energy of peace, love, and good vibes. It’s these attributes that made it possible for her to do everything she accomplished in the span of the hectic year that was 2020.

For reference, in 2020, Deau Eyes released her debut album, put out music videos for every single track on said album at her YouTube channel, compiled all of those videos into a video album — Let It Leave: An American Soirée — and joined up with Butcher Browns’ DJ Harrison to write and record an additional surprise single: “Haven’t You Had Quite Enough.”

All of that is remarkable in and of itself, but what is even more remarkable is that most of this was done during quarantine. “My brother Michael and I, during quarantine, have been putting together videos just on our iPhones,” Thibodeau said.

Photo via Deau Eyes/Facebook

Her debut album, Let it Leave, took years to make, during which Deau Eyes endured what she called “management situations” and “label hunting,” as well as the COVID-19 pandemic completely altering her plans. “Everybody had something that they were really looking forward to and it didn’t happen,” she said. “Ours was South by Southwest, touring throughout the rest of the year, and releasing our album.”

But that didn’t stop Deau Eyes. Thibodeau tried to make the best of the situation, deciding to release the album in May despite the quarantine. “It ended up being the best possible way to end this album journey of Let It Leave, and actually letting it leave,” she said. “All the stuff that I was talking about needing to be let go, and having that sealing moment with my brother of, ‘We’re going to create these songs, our way.’”

With the exception of first video “Some Do,” released prior to lockdown, Thibodeau and her brother, with the help of a local cinematographer, were able to make all of the videos for the album with just her iPhone. And it didn’t stop there, as immediately after the videos were complete, Deau Eyes began to work with DJ Harrison on their surprise single, which is entitled “Haven’t You Had Quite Enough.”

Thibodeau said a big reason for the surprise was in contrast with the years of public waiting and planning on her debut album. “I personally waited so long on the last album,” she said.

But Deau Eyes didn’t wait at all to start working on the new single. Thibodeau quickly got to work with DJ Harrison, a collaboration she was personally exuberant about. “I look up to him so much as a musician, as a person, and a friend,” she said. “[I thought he would] make something beyond my wildest dreams and sure enough, it’s exactly what he did.”

According to Thibodeau, DJ Harrison played every single instrument on “Haven’t You Had Quite Enough,” as well as engineering every track except for her vocals. That wasn’t necessarily hard for DJ Harrison, but the remote aspect of creation, necessary due to the pandemic, is something he isn’t used to.

“I’m just used to working in the same room, and catching the vibe of the room,” Harrison said. “Having that organic energy in the room, it makes it easier for people to communicate.”

However, even working remotely, Harrison acknowledged that Thibodeau was an excellent communicator. “She did a great job of just vocalizing to me what she wanted,” he said.

But communication is more than vocalizing — it’s also listening. “The all-around importance for me is listening, being patient, and trying to understand the people that you’re working with. Whether it’s like on a personal level, musical level, or spiritual level,” said Harrison. “I can have my ideas all day, but ultimately she’s the songwriter, and I just want to make sure that I can honor her vision and be able to put my spin on it as well.”

The song that the two created, “Haven’t You Had Quite Enough,” showcases both Deau Eyes and DJ Harrison’s vision, demanding change and a better world through its words and music.

The process of creation for the song began many months ago, when Thibodeau saw news coverage of the detention centers at the border and the separation of families. “It hit me in a really intense way and just had me feeling pretty helpless,” she said.

After that, she started crafting the song, adding verses to the song anytime she found news that gave her that same sort of feeling. “I wrote… probably like 20 different verses for this song,” she said. “Because there’s just so much that I’ve had enough of, and I know a lot of the people around me feel the same.”

After all of the wrongs that have been done over the past year, working with DJ Harrison to bring the song to fruition felt like the perfect way to encapsulate that feeling of being fed up many of us have felt for quite a while.

“I think this song, ‘Haven’t You Had Quite Enough,’ is focusing on the feeling that we all have, no matter who we are and what we believe in: ‘Enough is enough,’” said Thibodeau. “We all need to seek change together and know that we have each other’s backs, because we have a lot more in common than we do differences.”

Top Photo by Matt Shofner, via Deau Eyes/Facebook

Scott Clark: Drummer, Composer, Storyteller

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Richmond-based musician Scott Clark believes in telling stories with his music. His new album, “This Darkness” — coming this month from Richmond label Out Of Your Head Records — is a meditative piece inspired by a Rainer Maria Rilke poem.

Scott Clark has a lighthearted way of speaking about his chosen medium. His voice is filled with care for his instruments and inspirations, as well as understanding of the uneasiness newer listeners may have.

Calling This Darkness — his upcoming album, set to be released on January 15 — a solo drum set record wouldn’t be false, but it doesn’t quite capture the dynamic, meditative work he puts forward. For Clark, his solo recording was an opportunity to tell stories through his work. 

“The idea of trying to storytell … trying to touch on certain subjects, trying to figure out ways to convey meaning and imagery with a storyline … that’s always been more important to me than just sitting down and playing for no reason,” Clark said. “I have an easier time connecting to something, and portraying that to the listener.” 

While This Darkness does center around Clark’s drumming, it does not actually feature any drums for the first seven minutes. Instead, Clark uses the harmonica to explore a sonic field — playing long notes, making space for the thoughtful, 45-minute piece to come. 

This Darkness was primarily inspired by the poem “Let This Darkness Be a Bell Tower,” written by the Bohemian-Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke, translated by Joanna Macy. One of Clark’s friends recommended that he listen to a podcast on which Macy had given an interview, and Clark heard her recite the poem on the episode. Before he went into the studio to record This Darkness, he kept the poem in his bag, pulling it out and re-reading it several times a day. 

“It really resonated with me,” Clark said. “It’s so succinct… when I went to go record, it was put down on the music stand that I had set up in the studio, and I decided that I would start playing to this poem.”

Scott Clark. Photo by Laura Ann Singh, courtesy Out Of Your Head Records.

The poem, like the album, is a thought-provoking call to mystery and tranquility. The first lines read, “Quiet friend who has come so far / / feel how your breathing makes more space around you.” The space between the lines resonates in the quiet sounds of Clark’s playing throughout the piece. 

Drawn to experiments with sounds, Clark describes his background in music and percussion as one of learning and exploration of personal identity. He talks about a teacher who instructed him to start the day with a bit of improvisation, and end it with something completely different — something he wouldn’t normally think to practice. 

“I used to scrape a fork on my cymbal for 30 minutes, just dumb things like that,” Clark said. “I think you don’t realize what it’s doing for you until years later when you’re like, ‘Oh I have the patience to sit here and scrape this cymbal for a lot longer than you might want to listen to it.’”

That patience is a quality well transferred into This Darkness, which has a natural, gravitational pull to it. There’s a feeling of vast, open darkness in the harmonica loops, and an intimacy in Clark’s use of percussion — a sonic voyage of internal discovery. 

Before the pandemic, Clark used to do solo performances at local venues and gallery spaces. He spoke about wanting to avoid the “drumnastics” which are somewhat typical of solo drum performances, and instead focus on listener engagement and connection.

“I realized that because people are there, and it’s a listening environment, you could hit a cymbal, and you could not do anything else until the symbol was done ringing completely,” Clark said. “You could really try to bring everybody into that space. For me musically, that’s the biggest thing I’m after — connection to a listener, no matter how big or small it might be.” 

Using Macy’s translation of the Rilke poem as a catalyst, Clark composed and recorded This Darkness in one sitting. He then went back and divided the record into songs, naming each song after lines in the poem in order to convey some of the meaning he had gleaned from the words. 

“I was really trying to get into the space, and once you’re there you want to ride the wave, like you would if you were performing,” Clark said. “It felt natural to just go, because the momentum had been built, and record the piece.”

Traversing an exploratory, experimental arc in under an hour, This Darkness brings a quiet peace to listeners. It’s raw, restrained, and unique — even in its own subgenre. Clark is looking forward to the album’s release, and hopes to be able to play it for an audience someday. In the meantime, listeners will have to journey inward. 

“I hope it can shine light, and maybe give peace and space to someone who might need it,” Clark said. “You never know when your work is going to be needed by someone, so you just kind of have to keep making and keep creating.” 

This Darkness will be released on January 15 by Out Of Your Head Records, a collaboration between Clark and fellow Richmond musician and composer Adam Hopkins. It can be pre-ordered on vinyl and digital formats from Out Of Your Head’s Bandcamp page.

Top Photo by Peter Gannushkin, courtesy Out Of Your Head Records.

Up All Night With Birds Again

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Inspired by their own pent-up creativity during the pandemic, two Richmond musicians have joined forces to form an eclectic, energetic record label.

Musicians typically spend evenings in crowded spaces, either playing shows or watching friends play shows. Or they’re traveling the country, bringing their sounds to eager new audiences. However, due to the ongoing global pandemic, none of these things have been possible for the better half of 2020. 

So what do you do when you and your friends are unemployed, stuck at home, and full of creative energy? If you’re anything like local musicians Kevin McCormick and Will Fennessey, you launch a record label. 

McCormick — who has played in a wide variety of local bands, including the straightforward hardcore outfit Black Button; Comfort, a shoegaze band that explored rich sound textures; and Alice Blue, a delicate slowcore project — recalled the novel experiences that stemmed from the isolation and boredom brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic. He said he’d often find himself awake at dawn, having been up all night.

“I would be on my porch and text the group chat ‘birds again’ every morning when the birds came back out,” McCormick said.

McCormick and Fennessey, pre-pandemic. Photo courtesy Birds Again.

“Birds again” became an inside joke among those in McCormick’s group chat, which included Fennessey, a member several local bands including the synth-punk quintet Teenage Cenobite; Slump, purveyors of a distinctively psychedelic brand of punk; and Keep, which has been delivering loud, reverb-drenched shoegaze for the better part of a decade now. 

The phrase is now being used as the name of a record label McCormick and Fennessey are launching, with the goal of disseminating the music and art of friends they’ve made during their time as participants in Richmond’s flourishing music scene. Birds Again will be putting out their first release, an eponymous tape from local krautrock group DMO, on Dec. 18.

“[Birds Again] gives us a center to pour all of our stuff into,” Fennessey said. “I know that having a label — no matter how big they are — push you in some way is always just a good feeling as an artist. Hopefully we can be that for our friends and for ourselves, motivate everyone and make a snowball effect of musicians and artists that we’ve collected in our friendships.” 

Given that McCormick and Fennessey play such a wide range of sounds in the bands they belong to, it probably won’t surprise anyone when they say Birds Again will feature an eclectic array of releases. The duo said that they’re big fans of other local labels like 11 PM Records, Vinyl Conflict Records, and Feel It Records, but they’re eager to create an entity that is not limited by genre, a space that just about any form of music or art can call home.

“I like all the labels that are locally based, but a lot of them are focused on one particular sound or particular style,” McCormick said. “The idea was just to kind of make a place where music that’s outside of what is traditionally propagated in Richmond can have a home.” 

Fennessey said he became inspired to create a label free from the bounds of genre when Citrus City Records, a small tape label started in Richmond but now based in Brooklyn, New York, released music from his band Keep. 

“Citrus City, at that point, put out music from Crumb, Vundabar, and Camp Howard, cool indie bands that are really unique in their own way, but still nothing like rock,” Fennessey said. “Something Citrus City champions is a lot of weird bands, you never know what you’re going to get with Citrus City. I think that’s cool and we kind of want to pull from that.” 

This notion is particularly evident in Birds Again’s first release, DMO’s self-titled album. The band was born when shoegaze band Comfort underwent a lineup change, and with it, a change in sound. With players drawing from a range of influences from ambient to feedback-ridden psychedelia, DMO presents a decidedly krautrock sound. But it’s the penchant for repetition and a determination to push the limits of what’s possible with a guitar that gives DMO their unique sound.

“The guitar is pretty played out at this point,” said McCormick, who plays guitar in the band. “But we’re trying to find new ways to use a guitar; we’re trying to see if there’s anything else.” 

Repetition adds an aspect of temporality to the album. Listening to DMO brings more than just what you hear, it’s also about experiencing change throughout the duration of the music and developing a relationship with dynamic textures and harmonies. 

“One time after a show, somebody said that we played the same riff for so long that it started to sound mythical,” McCormick said.

“Or it sounds like a new riff,” Fennessey added. “It’s like an optical illusion, an auditory illusion.” 

DMO will be released by Birds Again on Dec. 18, accompanied by a video Fennessey produced (above). Unlike more traditional labels, Birds Again will place heavy emphasis on the art that’s being released with music.

“All of our friends have something outside of music that they do,” McCormick said. “Long term, I want to start incorporating those other things … if you have a project, we can just put it out there, whether it’s poetry, photography, any type of art.” 

Powered by a seemingly endless supply of creative energy, Birds Again plans on pooling together the music and art of friends they’ve made in the music scene throughout the years, giving a platform to work that might not otherwise find a home. 

Top Photo: DMO, via Bandcamp