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Ursa Major is the constellation of the bear. You're also planning to release a follow-up album, Ursa Minor ? What's the connection? In the end we're still in some way working for the man, which I never wanted to do.
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It's really more exciting because we always have the answer for somebody else. It probably would have been easier for us to come out now. I think that people with good music can go out and get it put out and it's eligible to find audiences in ways that it wasn't before. So now what's happened is it's become totally democratized. They were these big, powerful dinosaurs that were hit by the comets of digital music. The outlets for music were so tightly controlled by a few people who had pretty much no interest in music or understanding or sensitivity to music. It took a very long time and one of the reasons why was because music needed to be funneled. I think it was very difficult in the '90s. How different is the music industry for you now? Do you think it would be easier if you started today? You were huge in the '90s during the MTV era. It really helps us as well because we are fueled by it.
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The creative-expression part of that is definitely something that's happening through Indaba. We want to use the technology that's available to get closer to people, to actually make the community tighter and not have the sense of people being isolated and kept by themselves through technology, and instead, find out what's going on that's specific to them. You're partnering with Indaba Music for "Studio Access," which basically allows fans to compete in mixing your songs, the winner performing a show with you. That's why we're so slow at making records. I do other things instead of working on music and put it off. I just engage in a lot of self-hate and then I procrastinate. Then another song like "Non-Dairy Creamer" just kind of comes together pretty fast.ĭo you have any ways to work out your writer's block? I have songs I've worked on for three years and I can't get the lyrics right. If I don't feel the idea, the governing ghost of that concept inside the lyrics, it can really, really stump me. I still have trouble with some of the songs and the lyrics because I think that the reason for our shocking longevity is the lyrics. I read that for this album you had more trouble thinking of lyrics than in the past. That's my primary mode of organizing some kind of emotion or provocation into a piece that makes that emotion travel. I'm a drummer by training, so a lot of what I do is rhythmically based. The other thing I'll do is I'll have an idea and that idea will come in a rhythm. Then they oftentimes take on some cohesion. What I do is I tend to write down ideas that occur to me.