Interview: Samamidon

Conducted by Capt. Obvious


Obvious: The arrangements and orchestration on your upcoming album All Is Well really impressed me. Who was involved in the recording process and how did you hook up with Icelandic record label Bedroom Community?

Samamidon: The orchestral arrangements are by my friend, the composer Nico Muhly - he is also how I got connected to Bedroom Community. He's on the label too, and works very closely in many contexts with Valgeir Siggur∂sson, who runs the label and produced/engineered All Is Well. Iceland is a crazy place. I went there in November of '06 to put down the basic tracks for the songs, and then over the next six months things were added - Nico put down the arrangements in Iceland; I had various friends add things in the US - violist Eyvind Kang who's one of my favorite musicians, Aaron Siegel, who's a wonderful free-jazz drummer I play with a lot and who also works with Anthony Braxton, and my brother Stefan who I've been playing music with since we were kids. Holy shit, I just remembered that I dreamt about Stefan last night. Wow. I dreamt that I had seen into the future to find out how Stefan died. I was talking to his girlfriend Zara, and she reminisced forward into the future, that they were at some cave in the southwest, on a cliff, and Stefan just leaned too far in and was being funny, and just fell down into the cave. And I thought how strange it was that I had seen a glimpse into the future, to my brother's tragic demise, and I wondered if there was a way I could stop it. The dream also involved Owen Wilson. Anyway so then Valgeir worked his magic as a mixing person and emailed me mixes to listen to while I was traveling in Nepal and Bombay.

Obvious: You were something of a child prodigy on fiddle. How did the transformation into a folk singer/songwriter occur, and do you plan on revisiting your violin for any of your future work?

Samamidon: My parents are folksingers and I grew up singing with them and other musicians around Vermont. But in high school I was definitely more interested in fiddle playing, obsessed with traditional Irish tunes. And as a listener at that point my friend Thomas (Doveman) and I were beginning to listen to different stuff (until age 13 we had almost literally only listened to folk music) - Sun Ra, Chris Whitley, Miles Davis, Yo La Tengo, Cat Power etc., all that other wonderful music in the world. But only still playing fiddle music. It wasn't until we came to New York that we started playing other kinds of music. And for some reason, though I had never sung folksongs alone as a kid, just in a harmony singing kind of way with my parents or other people, when I started to learn the guitar a few years ago, singing the folksongs was a good way to do that, and it just kind of grew out of that by accident. But I still play fiddle. All the time. It is my favorite activity.

Obvious: The bulk of your material consists of adaptations of traditional folk songs that a lot of people probably aren't even familiar with. How were you exposed to this music and what made you want to tackle these songs on your albums?

Samamidon: I don't know how to write songs. Some of the songs, my parents sung, others I found on field recording compilations like Alan Lomax' stuff. It's what I felt comfortable singing, and I like how weird and elliptical many of them are. My favorite recording of folksongs is "Come Near My Love" by Bruce Greene and Kore Loy Mcwhirter. Just duo vocals, no instruments, unbearably intense close harmonies, incredible crazy murder ballads, and two songs about outer space!

Obvious: You actually starred in a motion picture entitled American Wake (I'm curious enough to put it in my rental queue). Tell us a little bit about the film and what that experience was like.

Samamidon: It's an indie film that takes place in Cambridge, directed by Maureen Foley. She cast me in the film after seeing my folk band play about 5 years ago, it was a very surreal experience, I had no acting experience and there was no rehearsal. I just wandered on set and spoke these lines for 12 hours a day for a week. I'm not sure that I'm any good in it but it was a fun thing to try to do; it's actually screening on January 5 on channel 13 in the New York/New Jersey/Connecticut area.

Obvious: Your YouTube videos are damn funny, especially the one of you singing "Leave Your Name" by R. Kelly. If you were to release an EP of similar covers, what would it consist of?

Samamidon: Thank you! The only problem with that video is that Robert trumped me with his youtube video for "Real Talk." Damn. A friend of mine also recounted this quote that he heard Mr. Kelly say at the listening party for the new chapters of trapped in the closet:

"People ask me, Kels, why do you keep on using the same backing track? Why don't you change the backing track?"

"Breathe in. Just take a deep breath [BREATHES IN]. What is that? What is that? That's air. That's the air we're all breathing. Just breathe that in. We need that to survive. That backing track is the air that those characters are breathing. Without it, they would die."

Covers... I have no idea! But I do deeply love R. Kelly. There is no better music for today's world.


Myspace: http://www.myspace.com/samamidon

Listen:
MP3: Samamidon - Saro

Tags: Samamidon, Interview, Captain Obvious