Guided By Voices

If there's one person Tape Op readers have been dying to see interviewed in these pages it would have to be Robert Pollard, the dynamic, engaging leader and frontman of the popular combo known as Guided By Voices. I know a lot of kids out there see Bob as some sort of messiah of low-fi, the guru of 4-track or the inventor of the practice-tape-as-LP concept, and while I do find his music entertaining, I see him more as a great pop songwriter and less as a recording guru. Nevertheless, I tracked him down after soundcheck when the supercharged GBV (Cobra Verde + Bob) blew through town in June in support of their new CD, Mag Earwhig (Matador Recs). The secret origins of lo-fi appear here courtesy of John Petkovic, guitarist for GBV and Cobra Verde. And apologies are extended to Robert's wife.

People are always writing in and they're saying that you're the candidate they want me to interview. I heard a story that the first time you recorded somewhere you hated it so much you actually burned the master tapes.

That was Blue Oyster Cult.

You were in that band too?

They were called Soft White Underbelly then. I have never actually burned a tape but I have shit-canned a project. I taped over it. We've had completely finished records in the can, packaging and everything, ready to go to mastering, and at the last second said, "No". Shit-canned the whole thing.

Because of the sound?

Yeah, the recording sound and other factors involved like I didn't like the way it was sequenced, but mainly the recording part. I've never actually burned tape. I may have erased it.

A lot of times people thought you were holding up a banner of lo-fi.

John Petkovic: I'll tell you why. I'll relate a secret about lo-fi. This is true. You know why he's lo-fi? His wife Kim would not allow him to spend money in a big studio.

She won't even let me buy pot. She's the reason for lo-fi. Really. She wouldn't let me buy a four-track.

John: That's why there was lo-fi.

Musically, all I have to my name is a Harmony guitar that my brother gave me and a really cheap little solid-state tape recorder that my brother-in-law gave me.

Is that what you demo stuff on?

Yeah. The whole lo-fi thing... we ran out of ideas for that as far as how far we could go with that. You can only go so far with lo-fi. You can only move the amplifiers around the room so many different ways and use so many devices and play on the side of the washer and dryer. You can only do that for so long.

It was kind of a dead end for you after a certain number of albums?

I like the immediacy and I like the warmth of a lo-fi recording. When I started a band I wanted to make big, good-sounding rock music. It was never a conscious effort to say, "Let's be lo-fi." We just retreated to the basement because of negative feedback. "So we'll just do it ourselves, for ourselves, and fuck it all. We're having fun and no one else likes it but we like it so we'll just keep it to ourselves."

John: And your wife wouldn't let you spend money on it. I'm blowing your cover. I'm sorry.

That's okay.

The last album you did at Easley Studios and I remember reading these stupid reviews which said that your sound had changed drastically. I didn't think that it had changed that much.

It's not that drastic. It's not that slick. If you want to hear hi-fi, listen to the new Foo Fighters album. Not to say it's bad, 'cause it sounds fuckin' good. To get a sound like that, you have to pay dearly. You gotta get a producer that costs $100,000.

[Someone mentions Steve Albini]

You pay Steve Albini what you can afford. He records bands for free if they can't afford it and if a band's on a major label he makes them pay more. He worked with Bush didn't he? I don't know if I should say this but I think we were $1000 a day.

John: I think he was working with Bush only so he could get some major label cred.

John's opinions do not necessarily reflect mine 'cause I don't know if John's a big fan of Steve Albini. I like him.

You did some stuff with John Croslin (Spoon, Reivers) too.

I like John.

Was he just coming through town?

He came in specifically for that. I think it sounds good but the guitar sound's not very good. That's not his fault, it's the place we recorded. They put the amps in these really thick-walled little rooms. Maybe he should have said, "Bring those out of there." I don't know. He's good. I heard that stuff he did with Spoon and it sounds really, really good. Britt's a good songwriter.

So what about the aesthetics of studios?

I still want it to sound raw. I don't want it to sound studio-slick. It's a carryover from the basement. We finally got the sound we wanted in the basement and there was only so much we could do with it and now the challenge is to get the vocal sound we like and the noise sounds we like. To try to use that, somehow, in the big studio. You've got to have a studio you're comfortable with. You've got to be as comfortable in a big studio as you are in a basement and that's a tough thing. I never did like studios.

Too sterile?

Too sterile; too removed. Working with engineers that really don't give a fuck about you. They're doing their best just to tolerate you.

I would think that at this point there would be a logical progression where there are comfortable studios and there are people who give a fuck about you.

There might be some people who are like, "I'd like them to be lo-fi forever". When would that dwindle? People would start dropping off. "Oh, I've had enough of that."

I can't see that an outsider has a place to tell a band what to do in the first place.

I don't regret the days of lo-fi, but now if I make a compilation tape of GBV for somebody, I wish that some of these songs were recorded better so the compilation tape would all be big rock songs. When we were making lo-fi in the basement we only used a four track. You know how some bands want to be lo-fi. We were more experimental. We wouldn't care if the drums were in sync with the guitars. To me that's not lo-fi. That's just being silly and experimental like the Beatles White Album type stuff.

Goofing around and having the freedom to feel like you could do that.

But the whole "lo-fi" thing... at least it opened the doors for us. There was something for us to jump on. Something people could associate our music with. It was a genre that came about because there was nowhere left to go.

And then lump a bunch of people together that don't necessarily have the same aesthetics. So what's Cro-Magnon studios (in Dayton, OH)?

That's a 24 track setup. They've got ADAT's. The guy's working there are really cool. They let you do what you want and it sounds good but I don't know. I haven't heard anything come out of there with a big, booming guitar sound. Maybe it's ADAT. I don't know. Maybe they don't know how. I've heard that when you turn the amp volume down real low, where you can get it real dirty without feeding back, and then you turn it up in the mix.

Little tiny practice amps can sound real good.

On a song on the new album, "The Old Grunt," we had some of those little bitty Marshalls (MS-2 mini amp) and the guitar part in the middle was through one of those.

They cut through.

Then you turn it up in the mix.

Are there any plans for the future. Are you recording after the tour?

We're gonna do some more touring and work this album a little bit longer. We may start recording in November. I have the next album written; as a matter of fact it was almost all written in one day. I like them that way. I haven't done that in a long time, where I was inspired to write 20 or 30 songs in one day.

How do you like working with Don Depew (at 609 in Cleveland)?

Don's good. We were real uncomfortable with each other on this last album but that's gotten better. I wasn't as experimental with the vocal sound as I'd have liked to have been. I'm real happy with the drum and guitar sounds. I think it sounds good.

Was he making you sing through his Peavey mics?

Umm, yeah.

I heard you were really into some Radio Shack mic.

On our four track stuff we did through some Radio Shack... a wide head, wide mouth mic.

Do you remember what it was called, what number it had or anything?

I don't know. Realistic or something. It was so wide that it captured more, like the whole room or something. That's what we called the "Hot Freaks" sound. When we first got a good vocal sound was the "Hot Freaks" song. That's the sound I want to get. I think on the next album I'm gonna try to get that in a big studio. We tried to get that on Under the Bushes, Under the Stars and we had to actually use a fuckin' four track to do it. And we had to use that mic. I want to try to get that where it sounds like that but it's bigger.

Do you play around with effects and stuff?

We play around with pedals and sing through amps. Toby had a thing called a Memory Man. We used that for the "Hot Freaks" sound. You should check out a Memory Man sometime.

What other technical stuff can you think of?

Did you say testicle stuff? I got a vasectomy and my nuts got this big (indicates a large area in his lap). Dude, it was purple, it fucked me up and I thought I was gonna die. I had to go back and they cut it open and they squeezed all that puss out.

That sounds painful. No, technical questions.

You can ask me technical questions but I don't know how much I can answer. You just want to capture the song the way you hear it in your head. That's the art and the difficult part. And you don't want to spend too much time on it 'cause it loses something if you do.

With all these different tracks recorded at different studios... do you record multiple versions of the same songs at different places?

Occasionally but not usually. That's been the case for the last couple of albums 'cause I've been kind of in the dark trying to figure out how to bridge this gap between lo-fi and hi-fi studios. I've been just kinda feeling around trying to work with people. The next album's gonna be really solid because I know where I'm at and what I want now.

Do it all at the same studio?

Maybe, but even if I don't I know what I want and where, on the last couple of albums, I wasn't quite sure whether I wanted to be half lo-fi and half hi-fi... I didn't want to jump too abruptly into the next level. Now I'm ready and I'm ready to push. But then again, I always change my mind. I'm gonna quit telling people what I'm gonna do 'cause I always change my mind.

I don't expect a careful outline of a plan...

It's gonna rock. Another White Album.