May 19, 2015

May 13, 2015

Albums of the Week

I've been making playlists again. I usually listen to entire albums all the way through, but that's been boring the shit out of me lately. The bigger the image of the album, the more I've been digging it. I also really like painting my face with ice cream.   










-Novak

May 12, 2015

Zone Out Music

Can't seem to keep my head out of the clouds lately. These albums make my brain swell with thoughts every time I hear them. They can take you to an entirely different place, regardless of the time or your surroundings. These are in no particular order.











 





-Novak

May 11, 2015

A Conversation with Novak: By Joe Reed

Over the last few years I’ve grown very close to Matt Novak, a local Cleveland musician, producer, great friend, taco advocate, and town weirdo. Aside from owning and operating Obese Studios in North Ridgeville, Novak plays in snotty hardcore / punk knucklehead crew Stray Dogs, the musical duo Doxa, and is usually up at 3 AM working on a myriad of solo material while the rest of us are stuck in the real world or, you know, sleeping. I’ve played in bands with and jammed with Novak and he’s always an inspiring cat whose work ethic makes most people around him look, well, as lazy as they are. I’m pretty sure this dude will be drumming in a nursing home band one day. Until then, let’s see what he’s thinking about. 

 
First of all, this Stray Dogs demo that just dropped is honestly great. I know you’re quite picky with the hardcore / punk stuff, what do you consider great punk music and how do you approach playing that particular style?
Thanks man! That band is consistent energy, which is what I personally think makes a good punk band. I don't really have an approach with it though. I show up with Sheetz, guzzle down some Dr. Pepper, and play drums really loud. Depending on the song, one guy writes a song, we all give our opinions on arrangements, then we move onto another. There's very little bullshit in between, which is very refreshing. The band works so well with communicating everything that we end up with a new song almost every practice. That's important to us just as much as it is for the people coming to the shows.
 
Explain the writing process for Doxa. How is that new material coming along?
Mat comes to me with a song usually already written, and then we both arrange it. Every song is different. Sometimes he has something set in stone and I just play drums, sometimes I pick at the parts, rearrange things, or tell him to exclude something. Sometimes he'll just loop one specific part over and over until something that doesn't suck clicks, and other songs come together in full in one day. We're finishing up recording another batch of songs and we're adding a few things we didn't add last time. 
 
You remind me very much of Steve Albini as far as producers are concerned insofar that you seem to try to extract the creative juices out of a band and let them try and find themselves in the studio. Who are your favorite producers? What do you think the role of the producer should be? 
Steve Albini is fucking incredible, so that's an awesome thing to hear! I know this is a vague answer, but it always depends. Some bands come through with their ideas already 100% set in stone and I'm just the guy hitting record, and some bands want me to fill in all their blanks. I'm fully aware that most people I work with want to just put out demos, which is totally cool. In those cases I don't do much tweaking unless told otherwise. Sometimes the band only knows a general sound, and we can all brain storm together to get a satisfying final product. 

Brian Eno is definitely my favorite producer. He's broken more rules sonically and collaborated with an entire catalog of musicians. His music is always unique enough to stand out, but catchy enough for people to grab onto. His solo records could make me go off on a three hour rant.

To me, the producer needs to understand that he is ultimately only there to be whatever the band needs. You are working for technically working for them. There are still lines that both sides need to be conscious of, which always boils down to good communication between the two sides. Some producers want to cram their own sound and ideas into everything that comes through their studio while others never offer any advice or criticisms. Fuck those producers. That's such a selfish way of working. It's the same as You always need to be blunt, patient, and understanding.  
 
You have played with so many people around here, who are your favorites and why?
That's a tough one. Each and every band was radically different in almost every way. I always admired the bands that wanted to do more than "run the set" or "jam" though. Tree No Leaves was the first taste and best example of this. We would write the music and then Dustin would start talking about music videos, t-shirts, and isolate each creative avenue we could for presenting it, without it ever feeling like work. It blew me away because I never thought about how easy it actually was to at least attempt to be on the level of the bands that inspired us to start playing in the first place. Ideas are cool to talk about, but doing them is a rare thing. It's amazing what you can do when you just fucking do it, you know?

Musicians that stand out to me are ones that have consistency in their talents and attendance. I can't tell you how many amazing musicians I know who just don't bother showing up to play. You might as well not be good at guitar if you can't dedicate at least a few hours a week into a band.
 
When the hell are we going to work on some weirdness together? 
I'll tell you later!
 
I know that Trent Reznor and Josh Homme are guys you really respect and look up to. What do you think makes for the perfect music career? How do you evaluate success?
They've both done a plethora of things that have blown me away, for different reasons over the years. It's been a while since Trent has really done anything that got my attention, but he will forever be my biggest inspiration. Josh is a bad ass to me for many reasons that oppose Trent's bad assness. You can obviously call them both successful, but who knows how they determine success. Some people have actual lives outside of music they have to successfully balance to consider themselves successful. I don't have a girlfriend to keep happy, a baby to feed, or any of that other shit so my bar it set a little lower. 

What makes a perfect music career? I can only answer that for myself. If I was able to comfortable pay all my bills while creating and presenting music in the way I've always dreamed, that to me is successful. For me, I have a looong list of shit I'd like to do with music, way more than just playing drums in a band that pays my bills. I realize there's a line between critical and commercial success. I've never been someone afraid of becoming successful with music. I would love to make every penny I can doing what I love, I just understand that the ideas in my head will never be appealing on a huge scale. That isn't being modest, those are just the facts. For someone like me, I don't have a life outside music. I know a lot of people want to be married by a certain age, start a family, and have a comfy retirement plan.. but that shit all makes me want to put my fucking head through a window. 
 
You lived in LA for some time, how is the music scene out there similar and different to Cleveland?
It's weird out there man compared to here man. I wasn't out there long enough to establish the huge circle of musicians to work with like I am here, but I was definitely there long enough to form a strong opinion. Everything snowballs bigger and faster out there. For example.. working at the Guitar Center out there exposed me to an entirely new bread of douchebags. Everyone's aware of the egomaniac musicians with the "too cool for school" kind of attitude, but these mother fuckers took it to an entirely different level. Bands will do photo shoots before even having a single band practice, they'll pay thousands of dollars to play music they can't stand in front of record executives they say they don't respect, and walk over every single person they can to get even the tiniest bit of attention. All of the live energy is choreographed! Guitar Center is the mother hen to all of these fucking dorks, and I worked at the main nest. BUT! I did meet a handful of very sincerely wonderful people out there that I still keep in touch with. People who ran their own record stores, studios, and record labels who were doing cool shit for the sake of music.

On the other hand.. Cleveland doesn't have it as easy to "make it" as Los Angeles in my opinion. It's easier to stumble into a jam session with rock stars who are practicing in the room at the end of the rehearsal room you're renting. We don't have 20,000 state of the art studios with producers known around the world behind the consoles. But other than almost all of my musical heroes living in Los Angeles, I enjoy the DIY, ground up type of process here in Cleveland sooo much more. Things here seem to be done more in a vacuum rather than what some record executive will think. People like Woods who book shows strictly to get band he wants to see and pay them fairly, people like me who record bands for dirt cheap so they can put something out, all the hundreds of musicians playing for beer and popcorn at local venues. That kind of shit may be going on somewhere in LA, but I never saw it. 

Living out there was hands down the most inspiring time of my life though. Being away from my hometown, essentially having no insecurities musically, and seeing things being created on such a huge level being put out all around you really made me focus on my music. It's an experience everyone needs to go through! I'd pick making music here any day, but I wouldn't be as motivated here if I hadn't been there seeing people do things so dramatically different. 


Medicated Robots. Explain what this is, how it came about, and what’s going on with that.
Medicated Robots is the only thing in my entire life that I feel uncomfortable talking about, sharing, and presenting. This is absolutely my "dream project" to actually get up and running. I really can't put into words how important and huge this is to me. As far back as I can remember, I've forever been the drummer in someone else's band, always putting this on the back burner. It's hands down my biggest personal fear, not being able to fully present this project and the hundreds of ideas I have for it. It's something I started working on in Los Angeles in 2009 and continue to work on to this day. Right now, I've played and written 100% of the material. I've put out two albums online and I'm finishing up my third. For the most part, the music follows a similar sound. The best comparison I heard was "it sounds like the Pixies if they did a bunch of heroin." 

It's depressing, noisy, droney music I make at 3am. I can always judge how close I am with a person by how many songs I've showed them of this. I've talked this thing up in my head for so long that it seems like wayyy bigger of a deal than it really is. I'm always inspired going to shows and seeing how easy it is to just shut the fuck up and play a show with a band.. yet I still never actually do it. I wish there was some lofty reason as to why I've never really tackled this, I'm just fucking lazy.


Why are you the worst person to order food with?
Hi. 
 
Would you ever only sing in a band?
Probably not. I'm way too awkward for that. I can get on stage and beat the fuck out of my drums with a serious face the entire set, but singing I would probably end up making a joke of it to avoid my self consciousness. It would be a bummer for everyone. I love the idea of fronting a wild and drunken rock n' roll band, but I also love the idea of my room being made of ice cream cake.  

  

Rapper Mos Def recently stated in an interview that he feels America is “a very difficult country to be creative in” and that our country basically doesn’t endorse creativity. How do you feel? Do you think by and large everyone is creative? How do we inspire people to be creative?
His statement depends entirely on the context it was explained in. I personally do not think people are by in large creative. I think most people are creative enough that they aren't blatantly stealing someone else's fashion, jokes, or songs, but I don't think many people truly think their own ideas from the ground up. There's nothing wrong with being inspired by something, but I feel like too many people and companies slap their shitty name on someone else's shit. I think by in large we do try to inspire people more these days than say the 50's. The internet and cell phones have opened up millions of doors in every direction for peoples' brains to wander to.

I don't think think creativity is encouraged as much as consuming is in America. It's out there depending on how you look at things, but I would agree with him that it isn't strongly pushed. It's pretty clear they want us to work, eat, buy shit, and spit out kids. It's different everywhere you go as far as endorsements though. Creative outlets are a luxury that some people sadly do not get to enjoy, much like education. When you're starving in a gutter somewhere, a glass of clean water is far more important than starting a noise rock band, you know? There are absolutely parts of this country and certainly parts of this city that are struggling to afford extra activities in education, but I don't think that should be any reflection on being creative. Creativity isn't confined to simple art and music. You can be creative in your thinking, speaking, and in far more ways than what someone can put in a shopping cart at Pat Catan's. 

Now in middle class America and up, anyone who blames anyone but themselves for their own lack of creativity is a fucking moron. In these types of cultures, you can't endorse creativity in my opinion. You can blame your parents, your teachers, and even more obnoxiously the country you live in, but all that shit shouldn't matter. Creativity isn't handed out by the government. I despise the mentality of people needing certain tools, budgets, or specific environments to create in. You don't need a Les Paul to write a song on guitar, your drum set doesn't have to be brand new to groove. Fuck that mindset. You should be inspired on your own every single day by every single thing and person you come across. I'm inspired by people I sit by at work whose lives barely have music in it at all, homeless people I walk past on the street who struggle just to stay alive, and then of course the songs I hear on my iPhone. 



-Joe