Interview: Why?'s Josiah Wolf gets personal

With deeply personal albums such as this one, is there a mix to be found between getting those feelings across and being guarded with some of the more intimate details?

In a way that's kind of the struggle. I think a lot of song inspirations comes from desperate times in your life and I think unfortunately those kind of details seemed very important at the time, seemed extra special and had to be put a certain way because it comes out of your subconscious. But yeah looking back on it, you sometimes feel the world knows more about your life than they should. As I was writing over the course of two years, there was a lot of stuff I didn't want to share with people until I flushed it out because there was a lot of stuff edited out due to being even less appropriate than the stuff that ended up being on the record.

Is that what being a songwriter is all about? Having to be comfortable with putting yourself out there.

I suppose. I'm only recently considering myself a songwriter, I'm just a drummer and a producer really. But I think through listening and through being inspired by other songwriters, the songwriters I listen to had to be like that. Most songs that I wrote have a real personal thing to them but they're not overly personal in a sappy sort of way. I think they reveal something about that person. It's a fine line, I think, for songwriters."

How long did the album take to write? It was a couple of years on and off, right?

Yeah I guess between 2006, 2007, that's when most of the songs were written. Even midway through 2006, so maybe it was really a one-year period where most of the actual songs were written but after that I had to shape them a bit better and put them together. So maybe more like a year, year and a half.

So I guess it was done between Elephant Eyelash and Alopecia? 

After Elephant Eyelash, a lot of that year we didn't do much touring - we did some but I was in California a lot. Then we recorded Alopecia in February 2007 and I was still writing a lot of the songs, or at least I remember doing one of the songs in Minneapolios while we were recording. So during that whole time I was writing yeah.

You moved from California back home to the Midwest around then, did that play a big part in the album or had most stuff been written at that point? 

Everything had been written before I moved back. Moving back enabled me to get some distance and to record everything like I wanted to. I wasn't able to get the recordings right in California for some reason. I bought a house here, out in the middle of the country, and that's where I got some of the final recording done.

There is a sense on the record of you being done with California, certainly on a song like 'Master Cleanse'. Were you sick and tired of California regardless of what was going on?

I wouldn't say I was sick of California - maybe some things about it. I did find that I got myself into trouble and into situations in California that had never really happened in my life before. It's kind of like blaming it on the place but it's not really necessarily because it's California, I like it but year I guess I didn't want to live there anymore. The people there, they're nice but they didn't seem like my people necessarily.

(Laughs) Yeah, I think so. He was very supportive the whole time, of the whole process. He'd listen to some of the songs when they weren't quite finished and had a couple of ideas. I thought he would be a good person to mix it because he just has great ears. I'm not good at mixing, I wouldn't try to mix my own record if I could and he has that kind of ear for detail. I had a couple of other people in mind but then thought why doesn't he just do it.
 

Well I had tried to record them a lot. As I was doing them. Some of the songs have like five versions recorded. I had a lot done, I started them with drums or a click track and came up with the arrangement but ended up scrapping all of it. I used a lot of the same arrangements in the final versions but at some point I realised these songs would be much better if I just played guitar and sang and then added tracks on top. It was a slow process, maybe slower that it should have been but I felt like getting out to my cottage in Ohio that I rented last year around this time and that was actually just a great time. 

 
Compared to a Why? album, it sounds a little more stripped down. You do play a lot of instruments on it but it is a lot more raw. Do you agree? And was that a pleasant change?

Yeah I agree with you. It wasn't a conscious decision to produce it that way but I think it came that way because it was just me while Why? has more people involved so there's a bigger sound. I liked the rawness of it. I think that's the kind of record it was. It was fun to have total creative control too and be able to play whatever I wanted.

(Laughs) No, he's very supportive but Why? is his project. We all have some say and as far as the production goes, I have some control but as far as lyrics and melody, that's all Yoni. He won't take any advice on that! In a sense then Why? is his solo project and he is doing some things at the moment. He's done a lot of demos and some of them sound really great.

You're going to be in the rather odd position of supporting your own band next month. Will they be your first shows or have you had a chance to road test the songs yet?

I did once. It was just a pure one man band, even more strippped down than on record. I dont believe in backing track, I might have one loop on one song but it'll be just me playing a guitar, kick pedal, high hat, jingle and a bunch of guitar pedals to add effects. Originally I had all these big ideas with some crazy set up but this is the best way to do it. I can just play songs and sing them. The way they're meant to be.

And finally will the experience tempt you to make further solo albums?

 

I have lots of other songs half written, some riffs recored from ten years ago. As far as organisiing that goes, I'm not in the head space. I dont know. Lyrically I havent been writing as much. My girlfriend and I have been working on stuff together, that might be the next project. But once I start writing, the ball starts rolling so I don't know, maybe I'll start writing on our European tour. We'll see what happens.