"If a band fits that bill and passes certain qualifications -- solid lyrics, not too annoying vocals, some uptempo songs -- I tend to get really excited and try passing it along. Music isn't a one person thing. It's meant to be shared. It's a kind of immortality that if an idiot like Elvis gets, bands like Spiral Jetty or Slovenly or the Homosexuals deserve too."

Conversations to An End: Bent Deer

Last summer, Marty took a week's vacation from his day-job as a municipal reporter covering a large South Jersey township for a daily newspaper to record an EP with a couple of South Jersey musicians Nate Ruth and Carolee. He recorded it mostly in a co-workers living room. The result was a fine jangly-pop collection of songs distributed among friends and colleagues that demonstrates Marty's witty humor and keen ability of writing more than just a catchy lead for a newspaper story. Still a municipal reporter, Marty has recently taken up with a band called Weapons, Florida.

You were a musician before you became a professional journalist. How would you say your day job has informed/inspired/impacted your song-writing? How would you say your approach to music differs now than when you were in college?

The two -- my day job and songwriting -- are mostly kept separate, though, in general, getting older and working with different kinds of people have helped me become more empathetic. All my songs used to be character assassinations- really mean spirited. I still write with a hint of that, but I work a lot harder now to try putting myself in the other person's shoes.

I resent "work" and all the pressures we heap on ourselves past childhood, but I've never had the guts to totally thumb my nose at the middle-class way in which I grew up.

I guess our breed of journalism is a way of staying comfortable while hovering just slightly above the seedier elements of white collar America. You also get an up-close view of all the different ways people tough it out in life, all the hoops and hurdles they overcome. I'm amazed at how strong some people are.

How would you compare or contrast the two disciplines, writing for a newspaper and writing songs on your guitar in your room.

They entail conflicting things. Reporting at our level is all about objectivity and spelling out your points. Music is so much fun, because you throw your own world view out onto the table.

Lyrically, I've always been amazed by songwriters who can use plain language and clear narrative structures to convey really important and powerful ideas, like Townes Van Zandt in the song "Poncho and Lefty." I'm not that talented and usually start with a basic idea and then tack on companion images and emotions, sort of like those brainstorming exercises from grammar school. The end result is comparable to taking a newspaper editorial, cutting it up and pasting the sentence fragments back together in no particular order. I want to engage people, but it's more fun for everyone involved if the lyrics aren't a straight retelling of the personal garbage that typically sets me off.

Also, the subject matter most municipal reporters tackle would make for God awful songs, unless you tweak it beyond recognition or use dismembered bits for some kind of f---ed up, DNA-style, no wave tune.

I've talked with a certain former co-worker about how heavy handed or totally absurd protest songs dealing with the issues we write about would be: how bad pay-to-play is, how high property taxes are, redevelopment, effective snow removal... I don't know, there's probably some brilliant bureaucrat/poet out there who could make it work.

Actually, when you think about it, there are a ton of powerful ideas inherent in planning and zoning. The towns in which our grandparents grew up have been overhauled based on the rules, or lack thereof, of all these invisible grids and land-use systems. In South Jersey at least, widely held planning beliefs made for sprawl and weaker communities. You have to drive everywhere. Walking is hazardous.

I guess the "downtown" has made a comeback in recent years, but developers manage to screw that up too. Many of the mixed-use projects being built to function as town centers in some of these characterless suburban municipalities end up looking like glorified dog kennels. Oh yeah, and you have to be making $80,000 plus to enjoy any of it. Good luck finding a record store or a place that sells used books. Tasteless.

Anyway.

Your Bent Deer EP was more or less the result of a week's vacation you took to devote to music so it's obvious that music is a kind of holiday (as the British would say) for you. What did you learn/take away from this most humble of recordings?

Collaboration is great. By recording with other people, the end result had the tenor I was aiming for but way exceeded my expectations. I would have never thought to put that kind of drumming on the songs. The dood whose living room we used offered a Sunday family meal's worth of suggestions that really improved certain parts. Even in the mastering process, my friend took vocals that I mixed too low and helped them make sense by adding a My Bloody Valentine-esque haze.

I've made solo tapes using my four-track for years, and I'm tired of it. The process last summer made me want to play with people even more. I'm in a band/project/whatever now with some old friends called Weapons, Florida. It's tons O fun.

You are the kind of musician I like to think of as a music fan first and a creator of music second. Do you ever get overwhelmed with all of the music that is out there, especially now that there are so many more ways for it to be distributed?

I found out what mp3 blogs were this summer. Ridiculous. I've been pretty good about limiting myself and taking time to digest any music I've acquired, though. Honestly, I'm in heaven. During the past year, I've found albums, seven inches and live stuff that I never thought I would track down. I'm not a collector, so having the music versus the $500 out-of-print record isn't an issue.

Limited press CD reissues are also easier to nab because of the Internet, because you can just order direct from the label. I'm still trying to take in the This Heat box set that came out last year.

I still go to the record store for most new releases and the reissues I know won't be bought up in a week. And nothing can replace the nerdy thrill of looking through a stack of records and finding something cool.

What would you say is missing from today's music world thanks to the Internet that wasn't there when you first started getting into music?

I actually think today's music world is a lot more egalitarian. It's easier to access music. People can get beyond the cool kid bullshit of "who has what" quicker, absorb the music and share as equals going forward. And every decade it gets easier for people to distribute their own music, flooding the market but also opening the door to all this potentially great stuff.

I think the scarcity of good music when I was young (because I didn't know where to look and had to embezzle lunch money to buy anything) maybe made me appreciate what I found a whole lot more. I love a lot of recent albums, but it's impossible to compare that to how you listen to music when you only have 20 albums and no chance of buying another one for weeks. At age 14, Pulp's "Different Class" was a mind f---ing experience.

This is why I need to have kids, so, as they grow up, I can analyze how they consume music. I'm going to be pissed if they listen to nothing from the late 90s and 00s but Radiohead. Cop out.

You did a bang-up job writing a featuring for an online publication about Spiral Jetty. What is it about unheard of, underappreciated, or somewhat forgotten bands that draws you in and inspires you to share their music with others, as you have on many occasions with me?

I like a lot of different stuff, but I know that I'm a sucker for jangly 80s indie rock. If a band fits that bill and passes certain qualifications -- solid lyrics, not too annoying vocals, some uptempo songs -- I tend to get really excited and try passing it along. Music isn't a one person thing. It's meant to be shared. It's a kind of immortality that if an idiot like Elvis gets, bands like Spiral Jetty or Slovenly or the Homosexuals deserve too.

I count on other people to do the same thing. Friends are the best conduits for new music.

It also gets beyond all the bullshit of music guides and compilations of critical favorites. People who fill out their record collections based on the agreed-upon pantheons for this genre or that genre should wash my socks and then wash them again.

What records would you pluck from a burning house if you could only save a handful? What records would you enjoy seeing burn?

I would risk life and limb to save the following: everything by the Go-Betweens, everything I have on Flying Nun, everything I have on SST and the Destroyer albums I have. I've never been able to find anything I like as much as the Go-Betweens or bands on Flying Nun and SST -- that immediate reaction of "Wow." Destroyer comes close. All the above music is really sweeping in different ways. It's all guitar based too, excluding the Destroyer album "Your Blues."

I would let the following burn: The first Aztec Camera album, which is total garbage; the first Gordon Lightfoot album, again total garbage; a T Bone Burnett album which my dad didn't like and gave to me as a Christmas gift; and everything mediocre I bought or downloaded because of hyped reviews on Pitchfork, Popmatters or Allmusic.

What would the bill look like for your dream show to play?

I'd be too scared to play with my favorite bands. If I was somehow intoxicated and could get beyond the sheer terror of opening for people whose music I love, I'd have to say the Bats, the Stone Roses and the Kinks, maybe John Prine.

I would want the Jesus Lizard and the Big Boys to be part of a later, second show that neither I nor any of the previously mentioned artists would play. They would f--- us all up.

For a copy of the Bent Deer EP or demos, send your mailing address to pekingspring(at)yahoo.com.

posted [02.24.07]

Past Conversations To An End:
Michael Miller - musician, card maker [12.24.04]
Jason Dodd - magazine editor [01.15.04]
The Rev. Into Rock - minister with good taste [1.04.03]
Nate Ruth - musician, music retail [09.07.02]

2002-2007 White Elephant Productions