Whether it was as the guitarist who created the gothic-western landscape of Shiva Burlesque 20 years ago, the even bigger guitar sound of Grant Lee Buffalo that rode herd in the ’90s (while he screwed up his courage to get his feet wet as a singer) or his current solo career (a wonderfully diverse summation of most everything that’s come before), Grant-Lee Phillips has become a consummate musician. Little Moon (Yep Roc) is the kind of record you keep playing until the songs refuse to go away, even long after you’ve switched off the electronics. Whether that’s a desirable situation or something bordering on mental illness may come down to a matter of personal taste. One thing’s for certain: If something as indelibly superb as “Strangest Thing” is madness, we say bring it on, baby. Phillips lives in the heart of what Johnny Carson used to call “beautiful downtown Burbank.” Speaking quietly, while monitoring his 21-month-old daughter in the next room (“We’re late bloomers in terms of our parenthood,” he says), the 46-year-old Phillips clues MAGNET in on selected highlights of the whole crazy journey. Phillips is guest editing magnetmagazine.com all week.
“It Ain’t The Same Old Cold War Harry” (download):
MAGNET: I first saw Shiva Burlesque play with the Miracle Workers at Berkeley Square in ’88. Do you remember that one?
Phillips: Wow, I do, yes.
I bought the album because Bruce Licher of Independent Project Records put it out. I didn’t know who was who in the band back then. Loved the music, though.
Bruce had started Nate Starkman & Son at the time. It’s funny isn’t it, a subsidiary of Independent Project? A secret branch of the C.I.A. [Laughs]
I loved the beautiful old building Bruce had back then, the Nate Starkman Building, down by the L.A. River, that same area that had Al’s Bar.
Certainly, certainly, and it’s now a highly sought-after place to prop your supermodels up against. They’ve shot a lot of commercials down there.
And it was used as a backdrop in Repo Man for that scene when the cops busted the guy with the radioactive trunk.
I always notice that place when I see it, and it turns up a lot. I actually saw Bruce about a week ago. He and Karen came to a show. It was great to see him. And I hooked up with him in Sedona (Ariz.), too a couple of years ago, too. They’re living near Bishop (Calif.) now, out in the desert. I think he finds places that sound like Scenic song titles.
How did you first get in touch with Bruce?
Probably that came from following Savage Republic around L.A. They were this primitive tribal thing, kind of like if you had only four guys to do a Burning Man. A guy with an oil barrel …
Yeah, and beating on it with a two-by-four.
[Laughs] Right. They took us out to play with them on my first trip to New York City in the ’80s. We played the Pyramid Club, a great show, at a CMJ.
Tell me about your first band to get national exposure, Shiva Burlesque.
Jeff Clark and I met in Stockton, Calif., where we’re both from. I moved out of there when I was about 19. But before I did, I met Jeff and Kelly Foley. Those guys were a bit older than me, and they had a band called the Torn Boys, and I started playing guitar with them. When I moved to L.A., Jeff and I kept in touch, and we felt like we could put a band together. It all kinda grew out of that. We were roommates, rented a little place in Newhall and spent our late nights making four-track recordings. After a while, we made a record, then a second album. I think our whole history was encapsulated in about seven years. We had a lot of fun in Shiva Burlesque, spent a lot of late nights at Bob’s Big Boy strategizing how were going to conquer the world. Or at least Burbank.
Refresh my memory, if you would. (Shiva bassist) James Brenner told me something I was going to use in a MAGNET column, about being the victim of armed robbery. But the editors switched subject matter at the eleventh hour and had me talk to Sonic Youth instead.
I think I know what he was talking about. We did our first Grant Lee Buffalo recordings, including Fuzzy, at James’ home studio. James had moved into a place in North Hollywood, and I helped him build that studio. And Paul Kimble of Grant Lee Buffalo was James’ roommate. That was part of the arrangement, that the roommates would have access to the studio. A couple of years after that, James was looking for more clientele, and he got robbed, a pretty traumatic situation. The guy answered an ad in the paper, and while James was showing him the mixing board, the guy said, “Great, we’ll take that, and you get on the floor.” I guess he handcuffed him to his table and took all his gear. James is a really creative guy. It’s unfortunate he had to go through that.
Was there a point in Shiva where you knew you wanted to do the singing?
I was the guitar player and co-songwriter. I wasn’t a singer. I just didn’t have the courage to do it at the time. I had a case of cold feet that lasted about seven years. But after so many years, I was really chomping at the bit to finish off the songs we never could seem to finish. And to do a bit more singing. Out of the rib of Shiva Burlesque grew Grant Lee Buffalo.
The only time I saw Grant Lee Buffalo was at Slim’s in San Francisco with Howe Gelb and Giant Sand in 1994.
Oh yeah. That was a really good time for the band. We were kind of at our peak, and that was a great Giant Sand show, too. Howe (Gelb) had his daughter Patsy playing Thelonious Monk. And Calexico was only about six months old at the time.
So the personnel for Grant Lee Buffalo pretty much grew right out of Shiva Burlesque.
Yeah, they almost overlapped. Joey Peters had been the drummer, and when Brenner left, we brought in Paul Kimble on bass. A lot of it comes down to literally airing our dirty laundry. Jeff was a stickler about clean shirts. There were a few rehearsals he didn’t make because he had to do the laundry. [Laughs] So, I said, “Let’s play some of my songs tonight.” Out of that we found another band. We all kind of moved along. I’m still friendly with Jeff.
How did it change once Jeff split and you took the helm?
I think probably we had to chase it for a while. I wrote a lot of different kinds of songs. I sometimes think probably that’s a frustration for a fan who wants you to stay the course. They’re not sure if they can follow me into this ragtime stuff. [Laughs]
Yeah, “The Sun Shines On Jupiter” and “It Ain’t The Same Old Cold War Harry” from your current album, Little Moon, for example. I love that stuff.
I think that comes from me being a child of the Beatles. I grew up enjoying the White Album and albums that were pretty diverse. I have no problem digesting that type of variety. But a lot of bands have carved out their own territory by doing one type of thing.
Well, I think your diversity is a credit to you. There’s one song, “Blind Tom,” with a cool string arrangement. Who did that?
The strings and horns were arranged by Paul Bryan, who produced the album and played bass. I met Paul through Aimee Mann; he’s got a pretty long history with her. He and I hit it off well. And Jay Bellerose is a pretty fantastic drummer. The three of us began to tour in 2006, and it wasn’t until that time that I felt I’d landed upon a group that was very much like Grant Lee Buffalo. I’d throw the songs at ’em, and they kinda knew what to do with them.
This record sounds like the summation of almost everything you’ve ever done.
Well, I keep chipping away at it. “Aaah, I feel like I got the song right, but I didn’t get the recording right. I wish I would have done that differently.” I’ve made records where I’ve played everything, and I’ve made albums with electronics, just trying different ways.
This one sounds like it’s recorded very well, I mean very, very well. Something that those odd people only interested in the sound of a recording, rather than its songs, would like.
That’s a testament to the engineer, Ryan Freeland. He’s got great, great ears and has no problem letting you do your own thing, and he’ll figure out how to mic it up.
You can really hear all the parts, and I’m someone who rarely notices that kind of thing.
Yeah, there’s a fair amount of stuff I’ve put out where my voice was further back in the mix, or it was underwater. [Laughs] I guess I’m comfortable now hearing my voice without too much on top of it. This album definitely puts the voice right up front.
Tell me about “Cold War Harry,” an intriguing song. Is that about Harry Lime and The Third Man, or no?
No, but I think I might steal that. It might become my official line. Somebody asked me if it was about Harry Truman. Or maybe Deborah Harry. No, the truth of the matter is a lot more banal. I was watching the news during the 2008 Russian-Georgian conflict, and the journalist, whose name I’ve forgotten now …
It can’t be Harry Reasoner, because he’s dead.
No, that’s true. So the reporter said, “Are we looking at another cold war?” And the correspondent said, “This ain’t the same old cold war, Harry.” I immediately said, “Wow, that’s a great song title.” At the pit of it is this culture where every day we hear about somebody testing their long-range missile system. So there is kind of a fragile state that we exist in. Being a new father, I want to concentrate on the more tender parts of life and maintain my optimism. But sometimes you start to dredge up that old saying: I don’t know how the next World War is going to be fought, but the one after that is going to be fought with sticks and stones.
—Jud Cost
