1992-09-18 The Triangle
How The Statue Got John Flansburgh High
By Adena Chernosky, The Triangle, September 18, 1992
"The quirky musical duo They Might Be Giants came to Philadelphia's Trocadero on July 31. Our good friend Adena (who you'll see wandering the offices of The Triangle, WKDU or the Troc on any given day) caught up with Mr. Flansburgh the day of the show. Here's what they talked about."
* Don't Let's Start: TMBG's Musical Background
Did you ever study music? If not, what did you study and what did you intend to do?
We had a little bit of serious studying and a lot of what would be called self-taught musicianship. John went to the Berkeley School of Music for a summer program when he was a teenager and I took jazz guitar lessons for about a year. I sort of figured out how to hold the pick better in those lessons but beyond that I didn't learn that much more.
We just had New York freelance day jobs. We were pretty serious — if we weren't in a national band I think we'd just be in local bands.
What are some of your musical influences?
I think the primary influence is the Beatles — just because they were songwriters who incorporated a whole variety of rhythmic styles. In a way, we approach what we're doing more like songwriters from the prerock era. We don't have one single rhythm manifesto. A lot of bands are "rockabilly" or "psychedelic" or "Manchester." There's something very homogeneous about it.
We appreciate the variety of different rhythms and genres. It's not that big a stretch. We grew up in the same culture as everybody else. We bought David Bowie records when we were teenagers; we bought Ramones albums. We were into punk rock a lot as teenagers. That was probably what piqued our interest in rock music.
What influences your lyrical ideas?
We write a lot of different kinds of songs. I think a lot of our songs explore ideas of paranoia. I think "Hideaway Folk Family" is a singularly paranoid song. It seems like there's a story to it but there's no object to the story. It's really just saying "be afraid." I think some of our songs are about being disappointed in what being an adult is.
We've written around 100 songs. It's hard to sum up what they're all about. It's a big range.
* They Want a Rock: Independence and Style
You have gone from being on no label to an independent label, and then a major label. What do you see as advantages or disadvantages and do you have any preferences?
I think the biggest transition for us was between our first independent release and our second. When we made our first album we had virtually no audience and when we made our second album we had a lot of people checking us out and paying attention. It was the difference between working in isolation and working in public. That was a big adjustment. I don't think any transition has been as strange since then. But it's definitely a rocky road.
Did the change of labels cause problems with copyrights especially with the Miscellaneous T album?
That was put out by the people who we had worked with on the independent albums. They had the rights to all those songs because they had put them out as B-sides originally. They still held the licenses. They could have put that record out the week after Flood and no one at Elektra could have stopped them. But it was a coordinated thing and that was good.
I think we're one of the few bands who have had a positive independent experience. We got all the money and we're still friends.
Do you find yourself gravitating to any particular style?
More and more we write swingy songs. It's not really jazz but it has that triplet feel. That's something we like that is probably a bit outside the realm of alternative hands. I've also been getting into really basic rock beats. "Dig My Grave" is a really good example of some thing like that.
There are a couple of bands in New York that I'm kind of into. John Spencer has this blues explosion band, and this band called the A-Bones. They're not traditional bands but they draw on a real "roots" rock'n'roll sound. There's also this band from Detroit — The Gories. I heartily recommend them if they're playing down the street from you sometime soon.
* Road Movie to Berlin: On Tour with John & John
This is your first tour with a full band. What about that transition?
Well, it's really loud, and there's a whole social dynamic that we never had to deal with before. With the band there's a whole new set of pacing problems. They Might Be Giants has been a two-man band for the last nine years and we've done five years of touring using basically the same format. Originally we were just trying to find a way to spice up the tour and were thinking about different guest musicians. Then we realized it might seem gratuitous sort of this parade of people on and off the stage. So we thought, "Why not make the leap to an actual band?"
It's turned out really good. We can do things more like the albums than in the past. We do a few things that take advantage of it, too. There's a section of the show where we ask the audience to come up with a song by somebody else that we don't know how to play. Sometimes they don't sound that interesting on paper but they come out really good.
In concert, how much do you perform from your new album? Your other albums?
We do an even amount. Let's see, we do "My Evil Twin," "Dig My Grave," "If I Wasn't Shy," "I Palindrome I," "The Guitar," "See the Constellation," "She's Actual Size" about a third of [Apollo 18]. But we do about 35 songs in the show and that's like seven, right? We do more songs off the first album than any other record, which really is odd. I think it's because there are a bunch of songs that are really, really short off the first album. They break up the set nicely.
When you are on stage you have a lot of energy and seem to be having a lot of fun. Are you?
I'm having exactly as much fun as I appear to be having. It would be very hard to project an emotion like that. Somebody was asking me earlier today. "Are there any songs you do that you're really sick of?" I think there are songs we would like to do that don't work too well and that's a drag. I think we probably even work harder to make those songs work. We used to do the song "Hotel Detective." For years it was a total showstopper and people totally loved it. It just hasn't been working at all. We don't really know why.
What do you like to perform?
Well, personally, I like doing songs that really show off my voice. That's kind of a gross thing to say. But really it's nice. I like doing the songs that have good harmony because it's something different. There are not that many bands that have real harmony happening, so when it spotlights that I feel we're doing something that not just anybody could do. I like playing the guitar really loud, but anybody can play the guitar really loud.
Have you ever been in a club and heard one of your songs covered?
No. I've barely even heard our songs on the radio or seen us on TV. I don't think we've permeated the culture that much. I can't imagine what that would be like.