Nardwuar’s New Calendar Peers Past the Apocalypse

If you’re not familiar with the oddball Canadian journalist Nardwuar, the guy who gave Pharell a perma-boner and got harassed by all of Sonic Youth in a parking lot, you should really start to re-evaluate the way you spend your time on the internet. Acquainted or not, Nardwuar has this new project that’s a calendar and a vinyl compilation all rolled into one big convoluted collectible package and we talked to him a bit about that, Andrew WK and 2012.

VICE: This is a pretty complicated and layered project. So, as I understand it, it’s a calendar insert that’s full of punk photos from Vancouver with corresponding interviews you’ve done regarding each photo or the artist in each photo that’s stuck inside of a vinyl compilation that mainly features your band, The Evaporators, but there’s a lot of cover songs from other artists on there as well.

Nardwuar: Basically, it’s just an ode to Vancouver B.C. I love Vancouver B.C., I love Vancouver punk history, so I got a whole bunch of bands, and in this case, bands that I’d actually interviewed to cover classic Vancouver B.C. punk tunes and that’s what the record was. Then I thought, I’m putting out this record, it’s fun to have a booklet, liner notes, why not expand it to include photos from legendary Vancouver punk photographer Bev Davies and put a Bev Davies calendar in there? I did a calendar with her in 2007. So, it’s an LP with a free calendar inside. 

Yeah and so, what’s most interesting about Bev? I mean, her shots are great. I really liked the one of James Brown.

She just kind of did it herself. After taking photos for a while, the local alternative weekly here, Georgia Straight, had her photos published so she got access to a whole bunch of other people. U2 is in the calendar. I never thought I’d mention U2 and Nardwuar together in the same sentence but yes, U2 are in there as well. She’s also the number one D.O.A. fan. She’s been in the game a long time, taking photos just ’cause she loves them and she also has great stories with each photo. That’s why it was really interesting to put together another calendar. You have the photos, you have the stories and then you have the tunes to listen to. All perfect for when you’re eating your cheese. 

(Laughs) What’s your favourite kind of cheese?

Still pretty much cheddar. 

Yeah? It’s a good standby. 

Yes, I kind of get exotic sometimes and like Huntsman cheese. Huntsman, which is a very sharp English cheese which I really enjoy. Huntsman. That’s my specialty. If I can get Huntsman, I’m really happy. 

I’ll try Huntsman. So on the calendar, every Friday has your face on it. 

‘Cause my radio show has been on CITR every Friday from 3:30 to 5:00 on CITR, and that’s incredible, Patrick, that you noticed that. Like I mentioned, I put out a calendar in 2007, did that, had 5000 copies, and now that I’m putting out this record, that just came out now, and even though you’re one of the first people I’m talking to to talk about the record, you noticed it right off the bat. That’s incredible. Thank you. 

I was actually showing it to a friend and she noticed it. But it’s a cool detail and everyone’s excited for Fridays anyways. What’s your favourite photo in the calendar?

I really like the one that’s on the cover of the stage dive at The Adolescents gig, because it tells a deeper story. There’s another photo [taken at the same gig of the same stage dive] by Edward Colver. He is an incredible L.A. Punk photographer and a version of that photo was featured prominently in a very famous punk book called Hardcore California. Now, Bev also took a photo at the same time that he took his legendary photo, so everybody thought, oh he’s the only guy that got the legendary photo of the guy stage diving. Well, Bev got the photo at the exact same time but from a different angle. So, it’s kind of neat to be able to see that. To me, the equivalent would be something like that famous photo of Paul Simon of The Clash smashing his bass on the cover of London Calling, and you know, wow, that’s Pennie Smith, that’s an incredible photo. Well, the kind of similar thing would be if there was someone else taking a photo from a different angle of that exact same incident. That’s kind of what I love about that photo. 

Well, that’s what’s cool about this calendar too is that you really try and examine every little part of it, from every possible angle, which is why it’s kind of like a lot to absorb. The fact that you have all these punk photos, but then you interview Bev about the punk photos, but then you also have interviews with some of the artists that you’ve done yourself. It’s kind of overwhelming in a way, in a good way. Do you know what I mean?

Well, thank you very much! I always have fun doing this and I’m just flattered that you’re really into it. I was going to say though, for my explanation of that Edward Colver thing, it might not have been adequate, you know, you can go to the back of the calendar and read the full explanation. That’s the great thing about it. Like, I hate being an expert, you know, and I don’t have to be an expert.

Yeah, and I guess in some ways people would consider you an expert, but really all you do is just continuously go straight to the source with your interviews.

Well, I’m still learning, and the minute I stop learning, I guess, is the minute that I quit.

You know what else is weird about your calendar? Seeing the year 2013 in print. It’s kind of strange, because a lot of people don’t believe that 2013 is ever going to come. 

It’s quite interesting, because it’s a 2012, 2013, 2014 calendar so it’s good for three years. And again, the calendar’s in the LP, so when you buy the LP you get a free calendar, and part of the reasoning for doing this, and I think you’ll understand from your ventures into publishing, when you walk into a record store, or even sometimes a book store, there isn’t a zine rack, there isn’t a magazine rack. There isn’t really a place to buy calendars.

Just package everything to oblivion and give it all to people in one little neat folder. So, you’ve got Andrew W.K. on this compilation. Have you ever heard the Andrew W.K. conspiracy rumours?

Yes.

What do you think of that? 

Well, my feeling is that, it’s gotta be Andrew W.K. He knows this woman, Sue Puchalski, and Sue Pachalski gave him some VHS tapes in 1995 that I’d sent Sue Pachalski. He watched those VHS tapes and he said that’s why he is the way he is today, because he watched me interviewing Sonic Youth, and Sonic Youth broke some gifts that I brought for them.

So, you sent this woman the tapes, she sent them to Andrew W.K. in 1995 when there was supposedly an older Andrew W.K. and…

And he knew about the tapes when I talked [with him years later]. So that means if there still is an impostor Andrew W.K., this impostor would have had been told about the tapes, but I doubt the tapes could have come up because it was so obscure. There was no way that the tape’s information would have been handed over to anybody. 

I think that debunks the whole myth right there. We just did that. Cool. So, do you have any thoughts on the 2012 conspiracy? I know it’s silly, but do you think the world…

Well, I wanted to have this calendar as part of the 2012 conspiracy. Bev suggested that the cover of it should have been me on a Mayan pyramid getting sacrificed. But, we took so goddamn long to put this thing together, or I took so long, that if you notice it’s called “Busy Doing Nothing, Better Late Than Never Calendar”. 

Well if the world ends…

Maybe we’re all going to miss the deadline.

@patrickmcguire