David J: unearthing tracks from the attic

(This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.)

Michael: I'm going to dive right into "Tracks from the Attic" because I find this fascinating, and there's a lot to discuss. I guess it would be three CDs. Is the physical release three discs?

David J: It's vinyl as well. The main thing is the vinyl release.

Michael: How many records is it then? Three?

David J: Three, yeah.

Michael: It's really cool. I'm kind of one of those people who love to hear raw recordings and demos and things like that.

David J: Yeah, me too.

Michael: I'm really into that as someone who records demos. It's just really interesting to hear the creative process in action. I mean, the creative process comes out in these things.

What's crazy is that these were recorded between 1984 and 2004, correct?

David J: Yes.

Michael: It's wild how it holds together. I couldn't guess which is which so much.

David J: I suppose I have a sustained, singular vision. [laughter]

Michael: Yeah, of course. How did you sequence this?

David J: Initially, chronologically. Then, we put it together as a sequenced flow. I think it's crucial—maybe it's becoming a bit of a lost art—but how you sequence an album is integral to how you receive the music. You can tell a story, you know, and you set up one track with the previous track.

I do the same with just playing a live set. I think hard about connections and links between tracks. You're telling a story.

Michael: I also managed a record label for a while. I had nothing to do with the music, but I did the sequencing for the album. And I'm as proud of the sequence I put together creatively as anything else I've done. I was so happy with the sequence and the overused word "journey" that it would take the listener on from beginning to end. It's such a lost… well, I don't think it's a lost art.

David J: I think it got a little bit lost for a while, and now it's returning.

Michael: Absolutely. Yeah, I agree with that. Are you leaving off demos on this? Are there things left off? Or is this like a…

David J: There are a few things. We are slipping those out as downloads and special tracks. Yeah, there's not much that's been excluded.

Michael: So you're cleaning house then with this?

David J: You could look at it that way.

Michael: The story is you had a friend who offered to digitize these old demos.

David J: Gabor Nemeth in Budapest. He was aware that I had these shoe boxes, two shoe boxes full of cassettes, and he volunteered to digitize them. So I just shipped them out to him, and he did a nice job, did a bit of mastering, and made digital files.

So I had all these, you know, as a trove. And when Bruce and Jeff approached me at Independent Project Records, asking if I had anything along the lines of demos and unreleased tracks, I said, "Yeah, actually, I've got quite a lot of that." And I just sent it their way, and they liked it.

I was surprised they wanted to do three albums. I thought they'd cherry-pick and make one album, but they liked it and were keen to do three.

Michael: How did you know Bruce? As a preface to that question, I'll say that I'm a longtime fan of his label and Savage Republic.

David J: Yeah. A mutual friend, Brooke Rush, has known Bruce for a while. I was aware of Bruce, but I didn't know him. I'm more aware of him as a designer. And a brilliant one at that. I contacted Bruce via Brooke, and he thought we should be in touch. He thought we could work together, and we did on a track, which I submitted for a sampler collection.

That was a nice collection. And then it did quite well. Then Bruce and Jeff wanted to work with me more extensively and asked if I had anything similar to what I had just described.

Michael: Knowing about him and his design, which I'm a huge fan of as well, I'm not surprised that he would want to do three discs, vinyl, whatever, just because I know how elaborate packaging, or not so much elaborate packaging, but just very beautiful packaging—I wouldn't get a better way to put it—is important to the label's aesthetic.

David J: Yeah.

Michael: And I've seen photos of the package for the release. And yeah, it's incredible.

David J: Yeah, it's gorgeous.

Michael: It's such a great document. It's just so cool that you record these demos over the years that are sitting on cassette tapes, and now they're a part of this really beautiful package. That must just be a wonderful surprise.

David J: I never envisaged that they would be released.

Michael: Does the appearance of these demos keep them from becoming finished, well, not finished, but, you know, band songs on future albums or records?

David J: No, last week I went into the studio, rerecorded three tracks with a full band, and did a full production job, which turned out well. This will be part of an EP coming out early next year on the same label.

Michael: Great.

David J: And made up possibly with a live, a couple of live versions of these, what were previously demo songs and maybe a track from a radio session I did recently that turned out quite well. So no, I have returned to the attic, as it were.

Michael: Do you consider yourself nostalgic? Does this make you nostalgic, listening to…

David J: Yeah, I am. I am nostalgic, yeah. I am nostalgic and romantic. But I'm always moving on. That's why these things get left behind. I don't wallow in nostalgia, but I enjoy it. [laughter]

Michael: I think about this all the time because I have my old band recordings that I revisit now and then, and I don't know, it's strange to think sometimes of, should I revisit these or just completely move forward?

David J: I hardly ever play my own stuff. I record it, and then I have maybe a week where I play a lot, and then I completely move on. I often hear my music coming at me out of the blue, like on the radio or in a restaurant. Sometimes, quite frequently, I don't recognize it, and my friends sort of give me a nudge, and they say, "Hey," and I'm like, "Hey, what's this?" And they think I'm putting them on, but I'm not. I'm like, "I don't know what this is!" [laughter]

Michael: Are you like, "I don't know what this is. This sounds great," or…

David J: I am pleasantly surprised quite often.

Michael: I'm fascinated by listening to the album, the demos. I've noticed on a few occasions it's almost like you are making notes about the full production of the songs. I'm thinking about "Blackmail" when you say, "Fade out and then come back into this." And then the gunshot sounds with your mouth on "The Badge of Lead."

David J: That's exactly what they are. They're just notes. They're my notes. They're little sketches. It's mnemonic devices, not intended in the moment of recording them for public consumption. It's just for my working process.

Michael: So the question is: when you write these songs, are you also thinking about how the production might sound?

David J: Yeah, absolutely. And I can hear it very clearly in my head. When I write the lyrics, I often put notes in the margin as to the instruments here, what they are, and where they should come in.

Michael: I'm taken by some of the song titles. I love creative song titles, and you have a plethora of creative song titles on this. Say, "Small Death of a Broken Doll," I love. "If Muzak Be the Junk Food of Love." Do you have a list of titles that inspire lyric songs? Do you start with the lyrics that bring you to the titles? Is there a process?

David J: Not a fixed process. Sometimes, I'll just think of a title, or I will receive a title. I'll hear a conversation or read something in a book or a newspaper article, and it hits me. "Oh, that'll be a good title." Or quite often, more often than not, in conversation with somebody, they'll say something, or I'll say something, and it immediately appears to me as if that's a title. And I'll say in the midst of the conversation, "Oh, that's a song title." And I'll write it down, you know.

Michael: Mm-hmm.

David J: If it's particularly arresting, that'll stay in my noggin and just stay and produce a full lyric. So, the lyric often comes just from the title and what the title suggests.

Michael: I like that. So, the regular host of this podcast is very obsessed with titles, and he talks a lot to jazz musicians and instrumental musicians about their titles. It's very interesting how different musicians have different attitudes toward titles. Some it's very important, they're trying to convey something, or they're trying to suggest the baggage of an image to someone who's listening to the music while others just couldn't give a shit, you know.

David J: I really care about titles. And the title colors the perception of whatever it is you're listening to. It's like a painting; when you title a painting or a piece of visual art, you point it. And I understand having the title being "Untitled." Then, the viewer can come to it without any pointers or indicators on how to interpret it. So, they interpret it from their own psyche.

Michael: Did you always have a recorder with you?

David J: No. Now I do. See? I have my phone. The demos stopped in 2004 because I switched to using the phone. And it's so much better. What is great about it is that I can record these demos, which I'm doing all the time on my phone, and then I can send them to the musicians instantly, anywhere in the world.

Michael: Yes.

David J: So that's great.

Michael: Let's say you have that now, but before then…

David J: Before, I would have to sort of carry it in my head, or I would play it on the guitar, but I wouldn't have a device to record it on. And I'd just have to wait until I found somebody with a cassette player. I didn't take one on tour with me.

Michael: Oh, really?

David J: If I came up with some on tour, I'd have to retain it. And some of those butterflies flew away. But I think that's, you know, sort of like the ones that survived are the strong ideas. And I would have that attitude. I think, "Oh, I think this is good. The proof of the pudding will be if I can still remember this when I get home from the tour in three weeks." If it's dissipated, then it's not worth pursuing anyway.

Michael: I remember seeing an interview with Tom Waits, and he told the story about how he'd be in his car, and he'd start getting a little melody and some lyrics in his head, and he'd have no way to do anything about it. He would then yell, "Not now! Go bother someone else!" [laughter]

David J: I know, I read that quote, and it's brilliant, yeah, I agree with him. Sometimes, it's so inconvenient to be inspired.

Michael: Did you have any tricks or anything to help you remember if that would happen to you?

David J: Yeah, and I use this when I'm trying to memorize lyrics, and I'm very visual thinking anyway, so I'll just come up with visual images connected with the lyrics. I will see images.

Michael: Like a memory palace, if you've heard of that.

David J: I haven't, but I like that.

Michael: It's like a way of remembering things where you visualize like a grocery list and you visualize your house. And it's like, okay, well, the soda pop is over here, or this is over here, and you sort of put things in places. And then, when you go to the grocery store, you can walk through your house in your mind and see all the things you need to get. I think I'm butchering that, but you get the idea.

David J: Yeah.

Michael: I'm curious about your relationship with candles. It came up a lot when researching this and reading old interviews with you. Candles as you're writing, candles as you're doing shows.

David J: Candles are very important to me. If I were stranded in the wilderness, I wouldn't have any food or drink, it would be cold, and I would be lost. I think I could survive longer if I had a candle with me. I could light it in the dark. I think there's some magic to that.

There's that glow. The candle is a very magical thing for me. I light the candle. It's also ritualistic when I'm writing a song. I get very frustrated if I'm somewhere and I don't have a candle, and I've got an idea for a song. I need that candle. I need to light that candle just to have that little glow there. It attracts the muse.

Michael: So if you light a candle when you don't have a song idea, does that do anything? Help you spur something on?

David J: No. [laughter]

Michael: Really? See, that's interesting because many writers have similar things. Some also use candles, like, "Okay, these are the three hours of the day I'm writing, so let me light this candle or start this drone sound."

David J: Yeah, and it doesn't apply to me. If I'm writing prose, it doesn't apply at all. It's only songs.

Michael: Huh. Okay, so let me dig into this a little bit. The muse arrives. It's almost like you're honoring the muse by lighting the candle.

David J: It is that, but it's more than that. And it's mysterious. I don't quite understand it.

Michael: I don't think it would work if you understood it.

David J: Yes. Good point. I don't know. It's become part of the ritualistic process for me. And I just like it. I use candles all the time. Just when relaxing or listening to music—I love to light a candle and listen to other artists' music.

Leonard Cohen was the same. I was actually on my way to Montreal the night he passed. There was some problem with my papers because they just changed the laws. You had to have this particular paper, and loads of musicians got caught with it, which happened overnight. I was on my way to play a show up there, and I got to the airport; they wouldn't let me get on the plane because I didn't have this piece of paper, so I went back home and got the news that Leonard had died.

I'm a huge Leonard fan. At the time, I was living with my wife, Annie, who was a huge Leonard Cohen fan. So it was lovely that we could be together and just light a candle for Leonard and be together and play Leonard Cohen's music. Then I went back. I managed to rebook, and I went back and played about a week later. I wanted to go down to Leonard's house and light a candle for him, and I was staying a long way away from where he lived. And I didn't want to get in the car, and I didn't want to ride on a bus. I felt like I should slowly walk for miles.

So I walked all that way and thought, "Oh, I don't have a candle, but I'll find one on the way. And there will be a store with a candle." And there wasn't. And I kept going closer and closer and closer. And then I could see the house down the end of the street. So I just went into this last store. The owner sold lamps and odd objects. And I said, "Do you have any candles?" And he says, "Oh yes, we have candles." And he had a lot, quite a lot of candles. And he said, "Why are you buying this candle?" I said, "Because I want to light it for Leonard Cohen." He said, "Leonard came in here all the time, and all he would buy was candles."

Michael: That's beautiful.

David J: Yeah.

Michael: Also, about the ritual aspect of the candles and everything. I notice you sometimes describe yourself as a musician/magician.

David J: Yeah. [laughter]

Michael: Which I know is a little, maybe a little cheeky there,

David J: It's cheeky, and it's also sincere.

Michael: Yeah, exactly. That's what I was going to say. I know that magic does play a role in your thinking.

David J: Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Michael: And perhaps your creativity as well.

David J: Oh, definitely.

Michael: How does it affect your creativity?

David J: It's a matter of being open, receptive, and attuned to the inspiration that can come from events that could be perceived as disastrous or accidents, things going wrong. That's what I'm attuned to, and that's where the magic lies.

Like Leonard Cohen said, "There's a crack in everything; that's how the light gets in." When those things happen, then these are gifts. And I love that. So that's one aspect of magic. There are many aspects, but that's a good one. I mean, when you sort of tune into that kind of thing, it seems to happen more often. The accidents happen more often.

But things were happening all the time. You notice that sounds were going on when you were tuned to this frequency—random sounds and events. Although I'm focused on maybe a practical endeavor in the studio, part of me is always attuned to this other level of consciousness.

And I'll hear things many people in the studio won't hear. And I'll say, "Oh, what's that?" "What are you talking about?" I hear something outside, you know, sound. The machinery makes a hum, which somehow connects with what I'm working on. It's resonating. So then I mic up whatever it is, making that hum, and introduce it into the process.

I think Brian Eno is very attuned to this with his Oblique Strategies cards.

Michael: Here, hang on. [holds up a deck of Oblique Strategies cards] I always have one right on my desk.

David J: There they are! Yeah. And I use those quite a bit. I've used them for years and years. And I love that, where you just take a card, and depending on your state of mind or what you're doing, you have a particular interpretation at that moment and then apply it to your work.

Michael: So, this is something I call "creative games," and you touched on a bit of an obsession of mine. First of all, let me also say, based on what you were just saying, I always believe that if you're attuned enough that you start noticing things that could be interpreted as coincidences, it means you're on the right track.

David J: Yes.

Michael: Yeah, the idea of the creative game is something that, when I was in college, I don't remember how I happened to cross it, probably because I was learning about William Burroughs and all that stuff. And I happened to cross the guide to the cut-up method, "The Third Mind." And just the idea of two people working together creates a third mind.

But if you don't have that other person, then inserting randomness or creative games also creates that third mind. It's a concept I love. And yeah, the Oblique Strategies are part of that. And I also read that it was your idea to apply the exquisite corpse on "Sky's Gone Out" to music. That is such a success, how that worked out.

David J: Yeah, and we did it three times. Bauhaus did it three times. The last time was just a few years ago, and we produced a really effective track using that technique.

Michael: Are there any other similar things you use in your creative process, like with and introducing randomness or creating situations where those accidents can happen?

David J: Sometimes I will record something, a couple of tracks, and then I'll record something blind. I'll record an additional instrument or instruments without hearing what I've done, but it's going on top of what I've just recorded. So it's completely random and free-form. And then you play it back, and then it's amazing how the results can come from that, how things just fall into place.

When you hear it, you swear that all these parts are being played while listening to the other parts because they relate. They just work so well. But I love that random element.

Michael: Yeah, it's funny how that happens, right?

David J: Yeah, it's like the Beatles did that with "Tomorrow Never Knows," putting all those tape loops together. And also applying the random element there in the… They didn't even purposely select them. They cut up a tape, put it into a box, pulled out the tape bits, and then spliced together. And then you played it back over the main tracks. That's a good example.

Michael: Yeah. The radio bits were supposedly just what was on the radio as they had the tape recording.

David J: I've done that as well. Yes. I've just tuned in the radio, and I've got, and now it's great because you have such a broader palette. I had this one app called Radio Garden, which is brilliant, and I discovered that via Brian Eno. One of my favorites, which I've used on several tracks now was the one he was talking about. He said it's his favorite or one of his favorites, and it's out of Russia, chanting monks.

Michael: Yes!

David J: So you know the monks are there for you whenever you need them; they always come through. [laughter] And then it's just in the moment. I just record whatever's on this; they will come through. The last time I used it was on the new Night Crickets album, and it worked so well. It's spooky.

Michael: I've been collecting sounds forever, and I have this folder of audio files of all these different sounds, whether it's drum loops, instruments, nature sounds, or whatever. I worked with a friend who knows about programming to create a little AppleScript that randomly pulls a sound out of that folder.

If I'm feeling blocked, my creative game is I'll pull three sounds randomly out of this, and I have to make them work together as a song. And I always come up with something. And the original sounds can be removed once I'm done. And I'm left with this song.

David J: Yeah.

Michael: And it's a song that wouldn't have existed otherwise if I hadn't done this creative game.

David J: Yeah, that's great. You see, it's also, it's restrictive. And that kind of restriction can also be very inspiring.

Michael: I think it's always inspiring. Constraints are always inspiring.

David J: Constraints, yeah. Minimize your options. I've got a concert coming up next week in New York. It's a tribute concert for Genesis P-Orridge.

Michael: Oh, really?

David J: Yeah. It's the premiere of a new documentary about Genesis called "S/he is Still Her/e," but it's, she is S-dash, he is Her-dash so that it's "her" and "here." It's quite clever and a great documentary. I'm featured in that. Then, the next night, there will be a big tribute concert featuring ex-members of Psychic TV. Genesis's daughter is involved, and I'm performing with Douglas Rushkoff.

Michael: Oh great, and who was also a member of Psychic TV at one time.

David J: Yes, he was, yeah, brilliant man. We've been discussing utilizing a random element in this piece called "Memorial for Dreamwalker." Genesis once told me that his magical name was Dreamwalker. I had this very profound, vivid dream about Gen, and I was at a memorial for Genesis. I'm going to recite or tell the dream, as it were, something that I was struck by, which is quite eerie.

I think the memorial in my dream is the event I will be attending next week. Because it is a memorial. So, I wanted to introduce an element that maybe Genesis could come through. We're working on that, Douglas and I, and what we've got…

Michael: Genesis would be the third mind.

David J: Exactly. We'd be creating the third mind. Genesis would be speaking beyond the grave, as it were. But I've got a list of things I haven't… [holds up a device] This Ghost Box is used to tune in to frequencies that are apparently conducive to the interaction with the dead.

Michael: I love it. (laughter)

David J: But beyond that, this piece lasts for about seven minutes. After every minute, there will be 23 seconds, 23 being a very significant number to Genesis and William Burroughs, as you know. The duration of 23 seconds is to introduce random elements.

I'd like to use this device in the repeated 23-second sections. But Douglas is also putting together some sounds, random sounds, some sort of system that produces random noise. We're still putting all this together, but we're working very much in that area for this event.

Michael: That's exciting. And I'm a 23 baby. I was born on March 23rd, so there you go.

Speaking of dreams, do you get songs in dreams?

David J: It has happened a couple of times. Yeah, and quite often in the dream, this music and this song appear amazing. And then when you go and work it out, there's nothing to it. There's nothing. It's not amazing. Occasionally, it is, very occasionally. I know Paul McCartney said, like, "Yesterday…"

Michael: "Yesterday" was from a dream where, yeah, the famous story he would play "Yesterday" for people because he was certain that it was something that had infected his head.

David J: Also, Ian McCulloch said that the whole of "The Killing Moon" came to him in a dream.

Michael: Oh wow.

David J: Lyric and everything.

Michael: I had a band in my early twenties and dreamed that Lou Reed gave me a song. It's very weird. We were in a car, and he was driving to calm me down. He sang me this song, and I woke up, hit record on the recorder, and sang it. The next morning, I woke up. I was wondering if that happened. I'd hit the recorder, and there it was. And my band did the song.

David J: And did it… how did it go?

Michael: It was okay. [laughter] It was cool. It's nothing I'd probably do after my early twenties, but it was okay.

And I just saw the Love and Rockets tour that was just announced with Jane's Addiction. That's exciting.

David J: It is exciting. Yeah. I'm looking forward to it. We took them on a tour with us in 1987.

Michael: Yes, I do remember.

So I went to college in North Louisiana for a little while, which, you can pity me for that if you'd like. You played in New Orleans with, yeah, with Jane's Addiction opening.

David J: At Tipitina's!

Michael: Yes, which was my favorite venue then. I can't remember why I didn't go, but three of my closest friends went down and saw it.

David J: That tour was great for us, and we became firm friends. The guys in Jane's—we got on well with them. It's the first time that we bonded with the opening act to the degree that we would hang out in each other's dressing rooms before playing, and we'd hang out afterward back at the hotels, and we just became great buddies and have stayed friends.

We have great mutual respect. We played on each other's records. It seems like a natural fit, and it's nice to be offered this gig by them. The offer came from them.

Michael: That's really cool. I want to talk about the bass guitar.

David J: Yes.

Michael: Dub as an influence. I want to bring this up because I have some favorite bass lines and one of my favorite bass lines of all time that pops in my head when I least expect it and loops around is the dub coda to "She's In Parties." If that coda were two hours long, I would be the happiest person in the world to just listen to that.

David J: We'd always improvise around that section when we played that live. I loved doing that, just going out there. It was never the same twice.

Michael: How did dub influence you?

David J: It was huge. I was into reggae anyway. Reggae was the first music I was really into. With my own money, the first album I ever bought was "Trojan Reggae Chartbusters Vol. 2." Shortly followed by Vol. 1. I went back. That was pre-dub, and it was great being in England then because there was a lot of reggae around.

Michael: Many great reggae productions were also around.

David J: Yeah. West Indian immigrants came in the fifties and established themselves and their families. They brought that music with them, which mutated slightly in England. But also, the stuff coming out of Jamaica in the seventies was incredible. Someone like Lee "Scratch" Perry—a brilliant, innovative producer—and many others like King Tubby.

When dub happened, it was so exciting. And I would always look at the record album credits, and a name that I'd see time and time again was the bass player Errol "Flabba" Holt. He's the man, and he's still around. Apparently, he hasn't changed the strings on his bass for six decades. [laughter]

Like me, I haven't changed my strings since we played Coachella in 2005. You get that nice round sound. It's pleasantly, pleasingly dull.

Michael: It's almost like a spirit to the string.

David J: There's a mojo in there, and I love it. And I think, again, we're referencing Brian Eno quite a lot here, but I think he made an accurate comment when he described dub as being truly abstract music, and it's a process.

You have a starting point, and then you take it away. It's like sculpture; you take away, you don't add, you take away. But in the taking away, you are creating something very pleasing. I don't know what it is about… I recently talked with Daniel about echo: Why is that so pleasing?

Michael: My favorite sound is a tape delay filtering out.

David J: It's something very deep, I think. It's biological. I don't know; it sort of connects with brainwaves.

Michael: So I imagine that's very important to you as a music producer since you're doing a lot of production for other people regarding the dub aesthetic and the idea of taking things away.

David J: Sure. Yeah. I do apply that. A lot. Yeah.

Michael: I'm in Orlando.

David J: Oh, right. Okay.

Michael: The last time I saw you was… You did the dub version of the Bauhaus set at The Plaza.

David J: Oh, yes. When Mr. Murphy was not present again.

Michael: For the second time.

David J: The second time! That was the origin of the new band, Shiva Saves, and we got an album, which was all recorded days ago. I mean, that band got together on that night. I knew that it was a band after about 15 minutes. It came to my head. This is a band. It's a new thing.

Michael: Everyone there was astonished. I was like, "Wait a minute. This is impromptu?"

David J: Totally impromptu. I didn't know that would happen until literally 10 minutes before it happened. And then my directive to them was, "Deconstruct, dub, just go out there." We had that spark between us. So we decided to carry on and create new music, which is exactly what we did. They're out in Texas, just outside of Austin. So I went out there. They'd already laid down some loops, drum tracks, and ideas, which was great. This would be interesting to you because it was a bit of a magic thing going on and weird in that I hadn't heard any tracks. I didn't want to hear any tracks till I got to them, and I had a bass, and I was going to play the bass. Do all the bass lines.

And so I said to them, I don't even want … I can't explain this, it's uncanny. I started to work out the bass lines before hearing the track. And then I said, "Okay, let's record." Then we rolled the track, and I'd play this bass line that I just worked out. And every time it went perfectly, it was in tune with the right key and feel. I was sort of thinking, "Well, this is freaky."

Michael: You were on the right track.

David J: Really in the zone. And this happened eight times. All the bass lines are my first time hearing the track and playing to it. So the others looked at me like, "What's going on?" So that was weird.

Then, I was approached by an event that happens every year in New York called Performa. It's like an art event that occurs over two weeks in different venues. It's very well put together, and they have a theme for it every year. Yoko Ono is one of the organizers. Laurie Anderson is involved in it, and we were invited to end the whole event, the grand finale. And the theme was, appropriately enough, 100 Years of Bauhaus.

This happened in 2019, and the Bauhaus movement was formed in 1919. Because I was in the midst of working with Rona and Curse on Shiva Saves, I pulled them together to do this.

I don't know if you know this single I put out on 4AD in 1981 with René Halkett.

Michael: Right, "Nothing/Armour."

David J: Yeah, you know it, okay. René was the original student who sat at the Bauhaus in Weimar in the '20s. And then he was a poet, painter, and many other things. I took his original cassette, the cassette recordings of his voice. We cut that up and randomized it. We used it in different contexts and flew it in over this improvised music.

We did a whole set of improvised music. I had an incredible butoh performer, Vangeline, and I designed this costume for her based on the Bauhaus mechanical ballet costumes in the twenties. And she was a very integral part of this whole thing. The idea was that it was going to be the history of the Bauhaus from its inception, going through its destruction or attempted destruction by the Nazis.

So, the Second World War came in, and then post-war, and then its lasting influence brought it into the present and the future. So all of that would be enacted by butoh, music, projections, and lights. And it was a continual piece of music just over an hour. And that went great. And in the audience that night was Nick Zinner from the Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

And he was blown away by it. And he said they'd like to work with us. So he's on eight tracks on this album and played some great stuff. The style is a kind of trip-hop, industrial trip-hop dub. I sent a couple of tracks to Adrian Utley from Portishead. He plays on it. Alain Whyte from Morrissey's band plays on it.

Mark Gemini Thwaite, the guitarist on the night in Orlando, plays on it. He was in Peter's band with me, and the drummer, Marc Slutsky, also plays on it. Anyway, so we got this thing. We just finished it. We're just starting to shop for a label now.

Michael: I will be on the lookout for that. Thank you so much. This was fantastic.

David J: Yeah, no, it's been great.

Michael: Thank you, sir.

David J: Thank you.