Editor Jess recently got in touch with Brooklyn’s Javelin, an almost indescribable duo thanks to their unique musical methods and eclectic tastes. The pair kicks off a national tour this week, so we’re excited to have gotten to speak with the fellas before they hit the road hard.
Jessica McGinley, Popwreckoning: You guys have been making music as Javelin for 5 or 6 years now — while it’s great to hear that you’re “one the most notable acts to emerge this year” from the likes of the LA Times, is this sentiment at the same time frustrating since you’ve been making music for so long?
Javelin: We can’t blame anyone but ourselves for that one– it took us a long time to “throw our hat into the ring.” If we had pushed our music out there before “it” was ready (our music OR the world) maybe things would have happened differently… We like how it worked out.
JM: No doubt. I’m glad it got out there at all myself! How has the move from your native Rhode Island to Brooklyn helped push Javelin forward? Do you ever regret the change of address?
Javelin: We miss our friends and loved ones who we don’t see as often. I don’t think we regret moving to Brooklyn as many beautiful things have happened as a direct result.
JM: David Byrne’s Luaka Bop label will be releasing your first full-length, No Mas, on April 20th. How different was the process of creating and recording No Mas from the self-released Jamz and Jemz demos and the Thrill Jockey 12″s?
Javelin: Well, Jamz n Jemz was recorded over a long period of time and was always changi
ng around, like a greatest hits album. We wanted the Thrill Jockey and Luaka Bop releases to be distinct from one another and cohesive in a way J+J wasn’t (by design, mind you). It still feels like channel surfing the radio, but maybe on a good day where the radio knows what’s going to go with what.
JM: You have such a variety of sounds and have said you’re not trying to figure out “your sound”; has this helped or hindered with trying to find a core audience?
Javelin: We have yet to see the result of our practices on a mass scale, but I think our sound is more cohesive than we think. When I describe how different we think we sound from song to song, many friends tell me it all goes together and to stop worrying. We are starting to realize that old truth that whatever you make, it’s yours. Our core audience maybe has been built by our live show, which has a way of making everything gel.
JM: After giving No Mas a few spins, I would definitely agree that its very cohesive. Oh, and awesome. For the recently released 2 12″, you allowed fans to send in their own record sleeves, which you screen printed and then, for a another $5, you also screen-printed a provided t-shirt or hoodie for custom merch. Who came up with this great idea and how challenging was it to actually execute?
What was your favorite record sleeve from all the submissions?
Javelin: Bettina who runs Thrill Jockey came up with the idea for people to send their records and t-shirts in– The Wall Street Journal actually called and was interested, which is an achievement for any enterprise. We haven’t seen any of the sleeves that were sent in yet, but the good folks at TJ are documenting the entire run. The sleeves we have seen really look amazing.
JM: The Wall Street Journal? Yowah. Thanks for still talking with me! From what I’ve read, your live show is something very special and very unique. Does anything in the live show match up to what you’ve recorded or is there a lot more improv based on whatever cassettes you’ve been able to find in the thrift shop that day?
Javelin: Well, there is definitely a lot of cohesion between our live / recorded musical thing. That video to which you are referring (where we take thrift cassettes and make a song out of them) is only partially representative of how we work– it is maybe one way that we work, but then we usually add way more of our own sounds and take away even more sounds that aren’t ours.
But YES improvisation takes place throughout our live performance. Tom [van Buskirk] gets on the mic and improvises lyrics, sings lyrics that were once improvised, or straight steals other peoples’ vocal parts and lays them over Javelin beats. And George [Langford ] plays electronic drums standing up and dances, which livens our songs up big time. But all the songs we are playing now in our set are songs that, if you’ve followed our releases, you will have heard before.
JM: I’ll be at the Philadelphia show on Friday, so I’m definitely excited to see you fellas do your thing. How did you get involved with playing at one of my favorite museums, MoMA, and what was that experience like?
Javelin: We were invited by our friends Graffiti Research Lab to play at the screening of a movie they had made for a Poprally event. We brought along our dancer friends from Providence, who were at the time known as Jazz Hand Job. It was surreal. One of the male dancers’ homemade underwear snapped open, revealing serious junk shots every now and again. Our moms were present!!!
JM: Whoa! Sounds like quite a show. You guys just finished up a tour with Yeasayer in the UK and this week are hitting the States hard for the next couple months. With less than a week in between tours, how do you unwind and then psych yourselves up again?
Javelin: Time at home with our lovely ladies, Miami weddings, hanging out with our pets. Then go!
JM: “Miami weddings” sounds like a show on one of those lady networks…that my roommates and I may or may not watch all night long on Sundays…But back to the topic at hand: How does touring in the UK differ from touring in the US?
Javelin: The audiences are, in general, a bit more reserved (as you would imagine). But ultimately people really love music and pay attention to good music there so it isn’t as if they are ignoring you. Plus we totally lucked our way onto a deluxe tour bus with Yeasayer so that will soften any bruised egos.
JM: I am stoked to see you Friday in Philly at the Trocadero with local favorites Man Man. What can Philadelphia expect from your performance?
Javelin: Sweat stains and hollerin’.
JM: That’s how we like it here! You join up with Yeasayer again in April — after having toured the UK with them, are you excited to get back together through the US?
Javelin: Very much so. Those guys still owe us money.
JM: Ha! Lastly, after doing a search on music scrobbler site last.fm, I found three other results for bands with the name Javelin: a visual kei (glam metal according to Wikipedia) band from Japan; a metal band from Germany; and a stoner/doom metal band from Boston. Has this caused any problems? Some long-haired dudes in sleeveless shirts looking to head bang and looking all confused from the front row.
Javelin: No mishaps yet. We were thinking about throwing a show in New York where we invite every band named Javelin and any band with the word Javelin in their name (Javelins, The Javelins, Javelina…). Maybe once we get them all into one room there would be a free for all, a meleé– but the idea is that we are all in the same gang.
JM: I like it. Bold move. If you can do it anywhere, New York is the place. Javelina is local, so maybe your people can talk to theirs and get that party started. Thanks for talking, guys. See you Friday.
Friday, March 5, 2010
Javelin with Man Man and The Skin Cells
@ The Trocadero
1003 Arch Street, Philadelphia
8PM | all ages | $14
Check Javelin’s MySpace page for more upcoming tour dates!
Javelin: website | myspace | @ DC9
Live Photos: Mary Chang
