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Willie Lane: Those liners aren't entirely apocryphal. Indeed, it was in Maine that I spent the first 19 years of my life. I've loved music for as long as I can remember, and I started playing guitar when I was ten or so. Before that I'd bugged my parents to get me a drum set, but they chose not to indulge me for obvious reasons. I took guitar lessons regularly for several years, learning to play "Stairway to Heaven" and other fret board staples, but I soon became drawn to approaches of anti-technique when I started listening to punk and things like that. My first real band was in high school, and it was of the hardcore variety with metal leanings. This was what Mike Watt calls "training wheels", or learning how to be in a band and play with other people. When that dissolved, I just jammed with friends somewhat haplessly until I shipped out to college. I wasn't too ambitious, and I suppose I'm still not.
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I started at Hampshire College in the fall of '00 and soon fell in with the dudes who run Apostasy Records, who were all a year ahead of me there. My mind was blown when I found other people who knew about stuff like Borbetomagus and the Blue Humans, and it continued to be blown further as I met the other folks in Western Mass who made up that tightly-knit scene. I had no idea when I left Maine for Amherst that I would be entering a sort of hotbed for the kind of music I was into, which at that point was mainly avant garde stuff. MV moved up there a year or two later, with whom I'd become acquainted through his live shows and, embarrassingly enough, a course paper in which I interviewed him about raga-style guitar playing. We became friends and he coaxed me into playing a live show opening for him at Hampshire that fall of '02, which was the genesis of how I came to record the COM disc.
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Something MV came up with—enough said. It has nothing to do with the way I eat or drink.What prompted the move from New England to Philly? How do you like living
there thus far? Do you feel your music has changed at all since you've moved there?
I was done with school and my record store job wasn't sustaining me, so it was time to move on. I sort of wanted to live in a city, but the expense of living in a place like New York was not appealing, so Philly entered the picture. The decision to move here was like throwing a dart at the map, but I already knew a couple people and liked the town from previous visits. Now that I'm settled with a cushy job and superb friends, I can say it's not a bad place to live.But moving to Philly has shaped the way I make music, oddly enough. Before I moved here in '05 I wasn't doing much of anything. The only solo recording I'd done was for the COM disc, which was made over the course of one day in January of '03 with MV very much producing the session. Aside from that, I'd played maybe three solo shows, so I don't have much to show from that time. When I moved here I began to take an interest in recording myself, and that's when the ball really started rolling. I suddenly felt compelled to make music that I would release on my own, which is very different than being asked to do
something by another person.You seem to take it easy as far as releasing your own stuff. Is this a conscious effort? Why did it take so long for you to start self releasing your own stuff?
Being light on the releases is not a conscious thing; I'm just slow. I plunk away at things when I feel like it, and I sit on recordings a long while before listening back to them. When I do get to work assembling stuff, then I become very methodical and try lots of different things in post-production. I doubt much of this effort or thoughtfulness on my part translates through such crude recordings, but it's in there.
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may very well have been the impetus for Cord-Art's creation. I like to wash all of these things down with something choice but affordable.So, who has the best cheesesteaks in Philly and why?
John's Roast Pork on Snyder Ave, without question. Their steak meets all my requirements: sharp provolone, near-caramelized onions, fresh rolls, and spinach if I need a green. It's also the biggest. But the problem with John's is that they're only open weekdays until about 12:30pm, and my cheesesteak cravings generally hit around sundown. For an evening snack, I go to Tony Luke's because their ingredients are above average and they'll put mayo on it. Anyone arguing the merits of Pat's and Geno's is just splitting hairs over the two greatest purveyors of mediocre sandwiches in the city, but they're the only option at wee hours. For the record, I prefer Pat's.
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I'm certainly no visionary, and there are no sketches or gameplans to speak of, really. Most of the music is improvised, meaning it's played without any sense of how it should begin or where it will end. But sometimes I have a riff or theme that I want to sculpt and that evolves into some kind of structure, which I may then decide to layer with overdubs. For the most part I just play whenever I feel like hearing the sound of my own music, and I roll tape when it's not too much bother to set up the mic and 4-track. Someday I'll listen back to the tapes and hopefully find a jewel in there. I'm becoming more fascinated with multi-tracking as time goes on, but it's more a window to discovery than a way to realize music that I've somehow imagined.
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I really wanted to do a double, but friends admonished me about the burden that would put on the listener. Now I think I'll just shoot for another regular LP. It's also a lot to ask of myself to put together enough music for two LPs when it takes me a couple years to amass thirty-five minutes worth, so I'm happy to concede to their point. But it'll be another Cord-Art release, handmade by yours truly. Working title: Willie Lane Helps Himself and Others.Are there any musicians currently operating who's music you find alluring?
I'm always excited to hear what Graham Lambkin is up to. It's astonishing to hear what beautiful soundscapes he can create from the most mundane sounds and hardly any equipment. I'm also a great fan of Joshua Burkett and hope to hear a new record from his nest soon. Chris Corsano is a consummate musician whose playing always leaves me amazed. Metal Mountains are a corker of a supergroup whose record I'm hoping finds its way to release
in the near future. There are many others…Any current musicians you despise?
I wouldn't even allow them the dignity of an Ayler-esque demise.[audio: http://viceland-assets-cdn.vice.com/blogs/en/files/2010/10/sleepy-hands-willie-lane-01.mp3]Willie Lane - "Sleepy Hands"TONY RETTMANWillie will be playing Saturday, October 9th at the Cakeshop on Ludlow Street in NYC at 9 pm with Watery Love and Strapping Fieldhands.
