DEATH CAB FOR CUTIE

By Whitney Wiess



Death Cab For Cutie’s knack for making great records repeated continued this past September with the release of Transatlanticism. One of the biggest changes in the band is new drummer JasonMcGerr, whose credits include a whole bunch of sessions work and a part in the solo debut of the solo album from Travis Morrison (formerly of the Dismemberment Plan). McGerr’s drumming and enthusiasm adds a great new element to Death Cab. Before their show at the Middle East, he was kind enough to discuss his exciting new day job over chais.

How do you know the band?

I’ve known the band since before the band was a band. I just to play in a group with Nick Harmer called (Eureka Porn??). We put out a couple of records…I met Nick when Ben was doing Pink???. His first band, not his first-first band, but his first band of me knowing him. And I lived with those guys for a short while. I met Chris Walla after the band had formed. And ofo who was the first drummer. Bellingham is not that big of a town, so we always saw each other. And I just stayed in touch with them, and they’d asked me to play with them a couple of times in the past, Before Facts, the second record, and then during Photo Album, before they found Michael Shorr, and it just never really worked until a year ago until the album cycle for the Photo Album was done and I wasn’t too busy at the time, and the whole introduction thing we didn’t need to have. We already knew each other, so it was just as easy as getting together and saying, ‘Yeah let’s play tomorrow.’ And that’s how it happened. So yeah, I’ve known them all, like I said, for about six or seven years.

That’s really great. You mentioned being busy during other periods of time. What other musical projects have you worked on?

Uh, I have been a teacher at the Seattle Drum School for about seven years. And I’ve worked with beginners to professionals, three year olds to 60 year olds. The drummer from Sunny Day Real Estate was a long-time student of mine, William Goldsmith, and so that level player as well as local professionals from Seattle and a ton of kids. A whole bunch of kids that I’ve worked with. And that’s a pretty rewarding job. But on top of that, I’ve also done a lot of session work…a guy named Mark Olsen who’s got a record out right now, I did a record with him. I did an album with this girl named andrea Maxim (?)…

(goes to get our chais)

Here you go.

Thank you very much.

Um, a lot of northwest people. This band called Left Hand Smoke that nobody knows about. A lot of session work where I got called to go in to the studio to record an album and I don’t even meet the people sometimes. This band called Neo…Just been doing a lot of teaching and a lot of playing with a lot of different people. Really I’ve only done a few West Coast tours and a little bit in the Midwest, but never as extensive as this, so this is a really great opportunity for me to learn a whole lot more.

That’s really neat. Are you enjoying the playing live experience moreso than sessions work?

Well I still did a lot of playing live, but never, you know, 50 straight shows. So yeah, it’s great, it’s amazing. The comradare and personal relationships in this band are really, really strong in this band right now. It’s like having a crush on somebody for a really long time and both people know it, but you’re either too afraid or too tied up to do anything about it. And we finally just got together. And I think that if you are, or if anyone is a fan of Transatlanticism, the new album, than maybe you can hear that…We began recording that record after I’d played with the group for two months, if that. Really no live shows, like one live show. I think that the live aspect has improved greatly, and that the work ethic’s gotten clearer and more defined and everybody’s constructive criticism are easier…people are just so comfortable with the music that we’re making right now, I’m talking about the people in the band, so it makes the whole thing really easy.

Now what do you think is different, because all of Death Cab’s albums are really good, the songwriting is really tight, Ben’s lyrics are really fantastic. And this one managed to continue in the cycle of progressing and being that much better of a record. How is this different than what has happened before?

Um, well the main difference is that Death Cab records, aside from the first one where the band didn’t have that much of an opportunity to play out, both Facts and Photo Album’s material, both of those songs were written long before the albums were recorded. The material was also toured on at least two or three times before the albums were recorded. So when it came time to put the songs on tape, especially with photo album, uh, they were maybe a little tired of playing them. And then they had to go out and tour again, and tour two or three more times. The material for Transatlanticism was recorded between I think November of basically, the winters between 2001 and 2002. We just broke out the material and started listening to it and started hacking it apart before we recorded that. So there were songs written literally a month before…so the material was really, really fresh and new. The group was new, it was like young love. Going into the studio with that kind of energy made this album feel different…so like I said, this material we are playing now on the road has so much energy from the fact that they’re still brand new to us. The songs are still changing and we’re figuring out how they work out live. Some may not work out live. You can’t always play 100% of an album. But so, does that answer the question?

Yeah.

I think Ben still has some of the same songwriting tendencies and tricks, but like anything else, the more you play live, the better you get at playing live. And the more songs he writes, the better he gets at writing songs. The more clever and introspective his lyrics are. And we all love it. Sometimes you record a record and you don’t want to listen to it and you  put it on the shelf and you don’t even tell people to go buy it, even though it could be a great work by someone else’s standards. You’re too close to it. You can’t tell. And I think that right away, as soon as we finished this record, we were hugging each other and wanting to listen to it all the time.

Well that’s great. I’m really looking forward to how it works live.

Well I hope it works out for you.

Have you been on tour right now for long, or are you towards the beginning?

We started the first of October and we finish November 22. So it’s like, seven and a half week tour. 48 shows in about 54 days. This’ll be, I think show number 20. And we still got, like I said, 28 or 29 to go.

What song off of the new record has had the most enthusiastic response from the audience?

Um, a few of them. People really like “sound of settling”, I guess it’s the catchy pop thing. They really like “they look like giants.” People really like “title and registration.” Uh, “New Year” because it’s that firstsong thing. Like, when you get a record that you really like and put it in all the time,  you get attached to the first tune unless you skip it all the time. I do anyway. I know that every night we play 8 or 9 songs from the new record. People always really enjoy “lightness’ “New Year”…the first week of the tour the record hadn’t really been out. So people would applaud and they would be really into it. The first couple rows would be singing words to songs, obviously they’d gotten some kind of copy downloaded or something. People were enthusiastic, but the longer we’ve been out, still there’s been some people who don’t. They love to hear the old hits, or however you want to talk about it. We still try to play at least 2 or 3 songs from every record.

That’s good.

Yeah. Do you have a favorite record?

I don’t, but I have favorite songs. And "Photobooth" is definitely one of those songs.

I think you’re going to hear that tonight.

That is fantastic.

Yeah, that’s a good one.

What are your favorite songs?

One of my favorite songs right now is “Epilogue.” I enjoy, I like a lot of the energy is on Photo Album. Some of my favorite songs they don’t play anymore. Or, we don’t play anymore. But we may someday. I had to learn 40-some songs or something like that, and I can learn anything else in five or ten minutes. It was a lot of fun for me, whatever the song was. Especially being a teacher and being someone who studies music, to study another player. Like to sit down and transcribe someone else’s drum parts, especially good drummers. .. All of those guys came up with really interesting drum parts. And they’re maybe not the ways I would play those songs, but to be forced to put on someone else’s shoes, gloves, and paint the part, it was a thrill for me. And also to be comfortable enough with the band, to have them, to hear them say these songs feel better than they’ve ever felt, it’s nice to be able to put my signature in some of those…does that make sense? So I have a lot of favorite songs, but I say that my most favorite is definitely the new record’s just material because I’ve been there since the beginning. Sort of given birth to it like they’re our kids.

And do you think, you know you have  all this experience doing sessions and teaching, Chris does a lot of production with other groups, everyone’s kind of played around. Most recently, I believe, Ben has been working with Postal Service as a side project. Has that brought anything new to Death Cab?

People ask that question all the time. Probably largely to do with the fact it’s done so well. Wherever we go people ask that question. I think postal service has allowed his voice and writing style to be heard by more than just Death Cab fans.

Right.

And I think that’s why that question comes up. But I think your sound is your sound no matter what, I think that with Ben a lot of the songs that wound up on the Postal Service record could have been Death Cab songs. And I think the fact that Jimmy Tamberello is a computer whiz and managed to compose some really great electronic music to go along with it is what made that record. But I don’t think that Ben has, I don’t think that he could walk away and say that he learned so much from doing that. It was totally a side project and no one expected him to do as well as it has done. And it was a good thing for him to do at the time, but, you know death cab has been his project for six, seven years. And this is where his priorities are, and I don’t think there are going to be any postal service shows in the future, simply because we have so much work to do on this [death cab] record. And, um, what’s good for the goose is good for the gander in a way. The success of postal service has maybe focused eyes on what he does as a songwriter, which comes right back to death cab for cutie. So, uh, you know people will ask, title and registration has kind of an electronic sounding drum part, but it’s not electronic, it’s just me playing filtered out. Chris produced it that way. But it’s not like, hey let’s make this song sound like the postal service. It wasn’t like that at all. It’s two different hats. And this is the one that I think he’s coming from all the time.

Are you sick of fielding questions about Postal Service?

No, no, did I come off that way?

Not especially.

No it happens all the time. Just like Chris gets asked a lot of questions about production…when there’s two bands doing well, it happens. No one’s sick of it, we all do our side projects. Nick was tour manager of postal service for their last US tour. None taken. It’s just death cab time right now, and it will be for probably the next 18 months.

It’s a good thing.

Yeah.

Death cab has inspired a whole lot of people to write songs. Who inspired you to want to be a musician?

Who inspired me? I dunno, I have…to tell you the truth, the first instrument I ever played was saxophone. My parents were into jazz and listened to a lot of Coltrane “Love Supreme” and was really into that, so I figured I wanted to play saxophone. When I was in the6^th grade signing up for band, the band director said, ‘Sorry I don’t need anymore saxophones, all the chairs are taken.’ I said ‘So how about trumpet?’ coz I had also Miles Davis’ “Kind of Blue” and was really into that record. He said ‘Nope, don’t need any trumpets. I need a tuba player, though.’ I said ‘Alright’ because I just wanted to play something. I got a fat lip, hated it, didn’t want to haul it around. So I had a friend that was playing drums, he was a good friend, he said ‘You should play drums.’ He already had a drum set, was already totally happening on his kit. He was probably the first person who inspired me to want to be a drummer. And then I started listening to great records of the 60s, discovered German prog-rock…being a teacher and having good teachers always inspired me, too. I never set out to make a living as a drummer, I just set out to enjoy music and play music. I don’t know what everyone else’s influences were, but I think a lot of people, it’s something you kind of fall into. Unless your father is Bob Dylan, Jakob sets out to be a musician. There might be a motive other than having fun. Or maybe it was fun from the beginning and he never intended to be a success. Or like Rufus Wainwright, you know like his dad. There were no other musicians in my family. I just had close friends who played instruments and we always enjoyed getting together.

Death Cab has done covers of Joy Division and Bjork. Are there any other songs you’d like to cover in Death Cab, and did Death Cab ever try to do other covers that didn’t end so well?

Um, there’s two heavy metal chapters that I don’t know enough of the, I haven’t been let into that vault, let’s just say. Right now we’re playing “Lovesong” by the Cure…I haven’t been around to see that many…The longer we’ve been on this tour, the more we goof around at soundchecks. I think we played “Free Falling” by Tom Petty the other night at a radio station in New York. Ben happened to know all the words. It wasn’t live on the air, it was just while we were getting the sounds right. So you never know what will happen. We enjoy covers, but you probably won’t see many more on the albums. We enjoy them live, though…I love seeing covers from a band, especially if they put their own spin on it.

When I interviewed Travis from Dismemberment Plan, he talked about the Death and Dismemberment tour and how he totally misheard some of the lyrics to “We Laugh Indoors” and was singing the incorrect lyrics…

There’s a particular line that Ben says, and in some people’s ears…Yeah, I think Travis got a good laugh out of it. Ben has a way of writing where I can fit those lyrics into my life. As a drummer, primarily I think about the music and the arrangement, sort of the score of it rather than the story of it at first…I wish that I’d been part of, you know, Death Cab’s history a little bit earlier on, but the timing was everything. Everything we’re doing this record is the most important thing. I mean, like in terms of enthusiasm, not material.

Is there much writing on the road or do you just have fun playing shows?

Not right now, we’ve been busy in Australia and a tour is going on in March and then Japan…because Ben is the primary songwriter we kind of wait for him to spend some time at home with his 4 track or his computer…and then we start talking about it…Actually, the original demos…Ben came up with close to 25 songs…some of them are totally use-able and we stick them in the vault. So we could do something, but.. (drowned out by din of coffeehouse.)

When you listen to Death Cab, what stands out about them, especially now that you’re in the band and writing as well and you get this really neat perspective. What do you think makes them stand out from other bands, what is it that they’re doing so well, that you’re doing so well?

It’s not so much what I hear, it’s what I feel. There’s a lot of great albums, a lot of great bands…I know that what I’m feeling when the four of us get in that room is a very obvious chemistry and, you know, we get along great and all the bands I’ve been in, I’ve done 15 or 16 albums in the last ten years, that I’ve recorded on them. The experience of working with different people and the whole teaching thing, I know that when you find four individuals who get along as well as we do and not only have a strong musical bond and intelligence but a business one as well, it’s incredibly difficult to find four people who have that all going on together. There are bands out there who make great music but don’t have a clue how to get the music out there, or how to tour, or deal with fans, or book a live show. Also, every person in this band is the same onstage as they are off stage, and that’s incredibly rare. I’ve never found anything that’s worth sticking with that long as this band…This is kind of one that I was always attracted to their music because to me it’s both emotional and intelligent songwriting. I like what Ben has to say, I like the way Chris records, I like their attitudes. I’ve been very welcomed by the group, there’s a lot of love. I haven’t experienced that with any other band.

I’m sure you get this one a lot as well. The band is continuing to be very successful, and you’re on an independent label. Has there ever been any thought, coz you mentioned your business sense and being able to book a tour and get a record heard, of wanting to make that switch to a major, or are you really, really happy where you are?

 We are as happy as we could possibly be. Bands sign to major labels for the wrong reasons and some sign to major labels for the right reasons. A major label is a bank, that’s all. If you want lots of distribution and to conquer the world, if you want to take more trips overseas, sometimes that’s a good thing. But there are independent labels overseas, too.

The image of the band wouldn’t change if we were on a major or on Barsuk, where we are right now, and it’s great where we are. Everything’s fine, there’s no reason to make the change.

I have to say, you have one of the nicest tour managers and publicists I’ve come across in a really long time.

Some of those people at major labels, it doesn’t matter if they’re assholes. And yeah. Nobody tramples on anybody. If there’s a problem in the band, it never seems to happen, but everyone always talks about total communication. We wouldn’t want to have someone working for us that’s like a bull in a china shop that would just go and wreck the thing. Same thing goes with the label situation. Josh at Barsuk is a smart businessman, that’s why we work with him. I’m happy to hear you say that, that our manager has been good to you. We want to be treated like professionals, and we treat you like professionals.

I appreciate you taking the time to sit down and have a chat with me about the band.

No problem. I hope you like the live show. Hopefully it doesn’t take away from your experiences but only adds to them.