Newspaper Page Text
Page 7
October 2, 1991 FLAGPOLE MAGAZINE
more than two or three days. Mainly when
you have an art show, 98% of the people
that ever see it are the ones that were at the
opening. The rest of the time it just sits
there. So, we’re gonna try to have that in
November. I have been working really hard
on this new series of photographs that's
really scary to me, because I’m trying all this
new stuff. I'm shooting completely differ
ently. I’m real involved with it though.
Mentally, I think about it all day long, and
when I get a chance, I've been getting
models to come out and pose for me and
then shoot. The technical tedium involved
in printing and exhibiting photographs has
kept me from mounting anything in the way
of a really large and dynamic body of work.
So, forthis, being agroupshow, Idon’thave
that need to fill up a whole space by myself,
which helps.
FP: And what's Pylon up to?
ML: Pylon’s playing October 4th. It’s at the
40 Watt, and it’s a Friday night. Lotion is
gonna open up We're supposed to go out
and tour in October, but I haven’t found out
yet if it’s been booked. Our manager is in
Turkey, vacationing. But I think she’s got us
going out on the road in October. And then,
I think we're playing at the 40 Watt again in
November. I don’t know if this has been de
cided, but I think we're gonna record a live
album at the 40 Watt Club. Well, it’s our
record company's idea, because they can
tell that we're not working on a new album.
They figured it out, so they’re like,
"hmm...okay, we’ll just hook up a bunch of
microphones and make a cheap album."
But they want us to play two nights in a row,
so that they can get all the takes. And I
wanted to wait, so we decided to wait until
later. I’m looking forward to hearing Lotior.
I’m managing Lotion, that’s another thing
I’m doing. They’ve actually been around
almost three years, because they opened
for us at Legion Field, prooably fall of ’88.
They had pretty much just gotten together
then, and they opened for us in New York in
’88, if that's the right year. It’s Nick Holt and
Curtis Whaley, and they haven’t really played
before large crowds, so I wanted them to
open for us when they had the chance.
They have a lot of really good new songs.
FP: Have you been working on any new
music. Dave 9
DB: My friend Mark Tissenbaum’s been
living [in West Virginia]. We wrote a rock
opera and recorded it in one day on a four
track. The place down the street from
where he was staying had 12-packs of
Labatt's for $5.99, so we started about three
m the afternoon and about three in the
morning, we were finished. A 60-minute
Ode to the Mothman. The Mothman’s a
West Virginia legend.
FP: What's the legend 9
DB: In the 18th century, the white man held
Chief Cornstalk captive at Point Pleasant.
West Virginia Chief Cornstalk wanted to be
freed to die in nature. The white man at
Point Pleasant refused. Probably was like a
‘‘dangerous injun", or something. So. any
way, Chief Cornstalk placed a curse on the
white men, so that all their decendants and
all of this whole area of West Virginia would
be cursed from here on out, for revenge for
not letting him go to the happy hunting
ground in peace. Anyway, people started
sighting the Mothman. You know that
"sighted" is like the Sasquatch or the Loch
Ness monster or something. The Mothman
is a regular sizod man, but he’s got these
big white wings and these red beady eyes
and he’s all white and he can fly and he
does all kinds of evil things to people in
revenge of Chief Cornstalk And he lives in
this old army barracks or ammo dump or
something near Point Pleasant, it’s a big
makeout spot for Point Pleasant teenagers,
arid there’s like teenagers who claim they’ve
been in Mothman’s house. He’s most noto
rious though for the Silver Bridge Disaster.
In about 1970, the Silver Bridge collapsed.
ML: And he caused it?
DB: Well, he was sighted flying from the top
of the Silver Bridge.
ML: That beady eyed sucker...
DB: And I met a girl in West Virginia who
claimed to have seen the Mothman. She
saw his red beady eyes looking in her
window one night. Personally, I think the
Mothman was misunderstood, much like
Spiderman. I think the Mothman is really
like a heroic do-gooder, a champion for
disenfranchise, who gets bad raps slapped
on him, like the faulty engineering job that
was done on the Silver Bridge.
FP: Did you see the Mothman at any time?
DB: No, I did not. I tried to really hard, but...
ML: It takes a lot of beer to see a Mothman.
FP: What kind of music did your parents let
you listen to?
DB: All kinds of music. My parents aren’t
big rock fans, but they’re musicians and
they understand that just because you don't
like a particular type of music is no reason
to exclude your child from it. My dad’s a
composer and my mom sings, and they
were in big band music. In most of my
songs, they have seen crumbs of merit, but
just the fact that I like to do it so much is
okay. My mom will give me in-depth cri
tiques of the records I send her. She even
offered to pay for us to go in the studio one
time, but she said she'd have to have a say
in how the record was mixed.
FP: So. what was MichaelLachowski like at
nine years old. musically speaking?
ML: I was a real avid record buyer. I spent
hours and hours in my room, listening to
music. My parents, they’re sweet people,
but they weren’t into like any progressive
music scene I’m sure one existed at that
time, but not for their age group.
FP: Do you send your parents your rec
ords?
ML: Yeah, they have copies. Their proba
bly more impressed with the fact that my
picture’s on the cover or that I designed the
cover than the music. They don’t have the
right experience with the music to put it into
context. It’s like us listening to some strange
folk music from some part of the world that
we never hea r d before. You can train
yourself to appreciate it, but only if you’re
really interested would you try. And my
grandparents, when they ask about F^lon,
they go,"How has your orchestra been?" Or
sometimes they call it a combo...I like or
chestra. You know, grandma it’s not really
like big band. We don’t stand up behind
those little borders with the [letter] P written
on them.
DB: You guys should. That d be great.
Little music stands.
FP: How long have you lived in Athens?
DB: I’ve lived in Athens for like 10 years this
week. Michael’s lived here longer though.
ML: About 15, 14 or so years.
DB: A veteran...a haggard scene veteran.
FP: He started it... according to that book..
what do think about that book?/Party Out of
Boundsy
ML: I haven’t read it. I borrowed it from
someone, and then I sent a copy of my
contract for the photographs to the writer. I
mean, to the author, excuse me. He’s
gonna pay me. I'm gonna read it when I get
really bored. I’ll read it when I go stay out at
my trailer at the lake.
DB: I think the Athens scene is probably
more storied in Clarke County than it is any
place else. Ten years ago. when there was
a handful of bands, it was a big deal to come
out of a place with so few bands. The
percentage of really good bands was bet
ter. And obviously, as you get tons and tons
of bands, the percentage of good bands
goes down. That doesn’t mean that
anything’s wrong. Even if there’s a ton of
bands and only five percent are special,
that’s a lot more special bands here than
anyplace else I
FP. It seems like it's gotten a little more
professional too.
DB: Yeah, to me that’s a drag. It's not tnat
everything has to be professional. There's
more bands that, as you say, are profes
sional. The thing is there’s still tons of bands
that are not in it for professional reasons.
ML: It seems like bands can t play at par
ties anymore, though. Now there's always
a noise problem. And that’s really a shame.
But lhat s the thing that really gives the
sense of professional behavior to the music
scene is that about the only place to see a
band is at a club, and if you want to see a
band at a club, then money’s involved and
when money’s involved, it just gets more
complicated I think that some of these
bands are probably more than happy to
play parties...they just can’t.
FP: And finally 7
DB: I would like to also say what a pleasure
it is to be within ten feet of Mr Lachowski
ML: Oh, shut up
DB: He's like a mentor, and I feel like I’ve
grown
FP: That's another thing being such Athens
legends. do you get hustled for autographs
now?
DB: Yeah, I got hustled for Michael’s
ML: Dave's asked me for mine a few times
now. and I’ve asked him for his. I want
another one, Dave
OB: Yeah, we’ve got like a whole trading
card set that we trade, just the two of us I’ve
got Michael's ’87 Inaction card
ML: (laughs) ’87 Inaction card...you're right,
that was a pretty bad year.
Fortunately, things are looking good for
both of them now Look for Pylon at the 40
Watt on Friday. October 4. Look for quite a
few bands in the studio with Dave. Look for
Michael's art show Look for a possible
performing venture involving Dave (shhh 1 a
secret!). Enough already... we re worn out
Just keep looking at them
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