For more than 15 years, Liz Phair has turned heads through brutally honest lyrics, and has become an empowering figure in a rock music world predominantly male. By phone, Liz discussed women in music, why R.E.M. are brave, and how art relates to music while observing the helicopters above her house filming the "non-wave action" on the California coast.
Her headlining tour for the album Funstyle will finish at Granada Theater in Dallas on March 17, and then it's off to Austin for an IFC Showcase at SXSW on March 18.
Also, look out for several questions that were inspired by fans.
Do you need to be in a certain mind frame and away from touring to write songs?
I actually find the opposite to be true…that touring helps me write songs. You know, when you have the guitar on a couple of times a day and you play a show almost every night, you’re connected. It makes it so much easier for what’s in your brain to flow out through your hands and watching opening bands or just being in the music environment- that much really for me burns better ideas and a better sense of, you know, what something’s going to sound like, so I actually find it invigorating to my songwriting.
And do you take inspiration from where you are at the moment in your tour?
Do you mean like locale? If I’m in the South do I feel a vibe or something?
Yeah, like that.
I haven’t ever experienced that. I mean I definitely notice myself where I am and that’s impacted me but I have never noticed it affecting my songwriting. Usually, you know, I’m not quite talented enough to change my style enough [laughs] but definitely we’re impacted by that town we’re in.
Are you still able to emotionally connect to all of your earlier work? And that mind frame you were in then?
Yeah, more than ever, and it’s interesting. I had a period where I did feel- and maybe it’s as simple I was the mother of a young child, and you know, that kind of screws up your game anyway- but I had trouble relating to my earlier work and I felt more frustrated by the press wanting me to be like I was 26 and all of that kind of stuff, but thankfully somehow I’ve moved out of that period and now it’s just… I almost feel like it’s profound that my earlier stuff has come back up to be part of my current stuff and it all seams together in a way that I haven’t felt in maybe a decade, and it’s really really gratifying.
You used to do a lot of art. Are you still interested in it, and do you do any art now?
I do. I do these crazy bizarre-looking drawings that are almost elaborate scribbles. You know how you doodle when you’re talking to someone on the phone or something? I expanded that into a series of… I guess it would be subconsciously driven… like large doodling [laughs]. It’s not really what I used to do when I took it seriously as sort of my main activity, but it’s that visual part that I’ve nourished and I think you need to keep all of your creative synapses firing.
And do you find a link between art and the music that you make?
Well you know, it’s interesting you ask that. The last four years I’ve been scoring for TV, and that’s very much the marriage of the visual and the musical. That’s really what it’s all about. We’re composing music to fit into a scene and sort of see the emotional component of that scene, and I really connect to marrying music. Then again, my songs have a visual way.
You do seem to do a lot of storytelling, so that does kind of paint a picture of what you’re talking about.
Yeah, I do that.
What do you feel about Funstyle being compared to Self-Portrait by Bob Dylan? The Guardian said it was thematically similar.
-Toni-Louise
I don’t know that record first of all, so I guess [that’s] an “X” on my face [laughs]. I guess anything Bob Dylan did would be great to be compared to. If that was a record that got him a lot of critical head-scratching, that would be fair too, but when I listen to Funstyle, even almost a year later, I would say it’s so completely what I wanted it to be and it’s kind of… I think it’s almost more like art rock, or it’s very conceptual in nature and I think the saddest thing about that record is that people aren’t going to listen to it all the way through from, you know, in the order that I intended it because that’s how I like to take it. I’m as guilty as anyone. I’m a song shopper, you know, iTunes. But, I really designed it to be like, you know, 1 through 11- just as I put it- so it’s so so sad because it’s not like I can hit the stop button because I do the same thing, but that’s how I designed it and it really is for me very satisfying.
There’s a question about the song “Extraordinary”, especially “..and I drive naked through the park, and run the stop sign in the dark, stand in the street, yell out my heart." What was the inspiration behind that song?
-Tarren
I think that was just to… you mean the inspiration behind the whole song? I think it’s about feeling not seen… feeling not seen for all you are and that desire to- especially- get the attention of the person that you love [and] that you want to see the most. You know, and sort of saying there’s so much more to me. I mean, I guess the sense of keeping your clothes on and stopping at stop signs and all these little things we do in life to keep us ordered and keep us, you know, drawing within the lines and doing things that are expected… I think there’s a lot of stuff that we cease that in a personal life where you just feel so much emotion and you’re like” screw the world…” like, “look at me, listen to me.” You know, that kind of feeling.
Musically, what are your goals in the future and what kind of music can we expect, or are you thinking of that right now?
Well, I’m going to be playing some new songs that aren’t recorded yet… that are for an upcoming album. We’re going to start churning them out on stage and see how they do. That’s exciting because that means we’re heading to more recording and another iteration of my musical development, and it’s definitely a sheer pleasure being in the studio. So, I always look forward to that and playing live has just been so… this for me after so many years of it being difficult for me… but it’s also been a pleasure. I feel like I’m kind of having a moment of being mature enough and experienced enough and expectations being teared down, so that, you know, people expect to see me, not a big pop production and they get me and I feel adequate so that expection... it’s just fun. And so beside touring and the new material, I don’t know really what’s going to happen in my life and I kind of like it like that.
You’ve said in the past that you were nervous on stage but you feel more comfortable about it now. Are there still moments that you worry or you have stage fright?
Umm, if I were set up… “by the way, you’re going to be playing in front of the nation”... yeah I’d get really scared [laughs], but I’d also have that kind of… there is confidence that we would do it and it would be really fun, but [we] wouldn’t be dreading it, [it] would just be more like felling the excitement that we’d do something like that. I feel comfortable enough that it’s taken that dread away, which is such a relief. Oh my God. I mean, I look forward to playing live now, but it’s totally different.
And these new songs that you’re testing out, do you think that you would ever compose songs while playing them live?
[laughs] I mean, that is such a great idea! I’ve never actually thought of that myself. Have you seen someone do that?
I have, and it didn’t work out very well, but I know a lot of people… like R.E.M. did that with their last album. They did a live rehearsal, so they had the backbone of the song ready, but a lot of the songs changed on the album from when they were live, and I was wondering if you think of doing something like that or if you have?
I never have. I have like had a thought of that once, like for a showcase thing where you can get asked to be a speaker on songwriting and you’re like, well, rather than speaking of songwriting let’s just write a song together here on stage and I’ll talk about it after doing it, but umm [laughs], I think that’s so ballsy of R.E.M. because it’s almost like- and I know this isn’t really the emphasis- but it’s kind of funny if you look at it this way… but they’re like “we don’t have time to rehearse or tour, so we’re going to just do it at the same time.”[laughs]
Yeah, it was strange.
It’s a time saver, kill two birds with one stone [laughs].
And, do you think music and lyrics are equally important and you focus more on one than the other, or…?
They’re 100% equally important to me, and I have learned something from touring and television, and that is about making sure that the sound of the music really illustrates what the lyrics are saying and making a point in the song. I think I used to be so grateful [that] I’d come up with any kind of melodic hook and kind of cool word, and I’d hook them together and think that was interesting. But as a listener, I think the music has to further reinforce emotion at any given point. That sounds obvious, but I think for a lot of people that create, you’re so lucky to be able to create that you don’t always do it well, and to do it well, the music and the lyrics absolutely have to support each other or they’re contracting. They have to do it in each place. So, I work pretty hard on that.
It sounds like the music you’ve made for television has really influenced a lot of what you’ve thought about music. Do you feel like your television work is just on par with the albums and you love it equally, or is the music that you record for albums still more important?
I think they occupy very different places in my mind. I’m such a creative person that I’ve really learned that about myself. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve really understood and accepted the fact that being creative is what I do. It’s like really what I do, and albums are a way for me to express my totality, whereas scoring is a way for me to express their character’s totality. Does that make sense? So, when I’m scoring, I’m kind of trying to do… I’m trying to give mini-albums for those characters, but it’s different when I’m making records because I’m expressing my heart and soul, whereas scoring I’m trying to express their heart and soul. You know what I mean? So there’s a lot of me in it but it’s different.
So do you look at the screenings or the scripts of the shows your scoring for beforehand?
[laughs] It’s so funny that you ask that, because I used to and then we got bombarded. So, hopefully in plain sight they won’t get pissed off when I say this, but like… 4 different versions of each script… every time they would change it and we like, started these e-mail jokes between us. I score with 2 other partners… just like, “do you have the pink version or the blue version that was on the green version or is it now…?” and we’d just like start laughing like once they started doing that. We’re like, still working on stuff. We’re the music people, okay? [laughs]
Do you have any plans to redo songs from Girlysound -like you did on the past albums- for a cleaner production?
-Marlon
You know, at this point I’m probably not, because now that I’ve put them out officially and they’ve been around for so long, you know, I doubt I would. I’ve got a lot of material that isn’t on Girlysound that has been, you know, unreleased or has been lying around and I really like that stuff. Now and again I think it’s important that every record has elements that are fresh- that were written 2 weeks ago and maybe some songs that no one’s heard, but that you really wrote two or three years ago or even longer, and it gives a kind of depth that I think helps records. That’s just my opinion. I don’t know, maybe I can totally see doing it the other way, like everything recorded is our record. That’d be cool too, but I do it the other way.
You said recently that you’re writing an album right now that is kind of Guyville-esque. Do you care about what the critics say about it or what their reaction will be?
-Marlon
I always hope that I make people happy. I really do try every time. I just seem to obviously be living on a planet of my own, but for not wanting people to like it… I just, I can’t let that be my highest goal. I feel like I’m drawn by a muse that requires of me to make art as my life that represents my life, not me trying to dance and sing for people’s approval. You know, like I actually do feel that way… that my job is to kind of live my life and make my art because I feel like it’s what needs to be made right now, and it’s almost like I see myself as less of a pop artist in the mainstream culture [and] almost like a female in that , you know, in the late 20th, 21st century… leaving a record of herself. I think that’s part of why I’m into making art. I was an art history major… studio art as a double major, and I felt like history was just blank. There weren’t records of women’s lives, you know? What were women doing? What were they feeling and thinking? We don’t know because they weren’t making art. That’s sort of my highest ideal… is to keep a track record of my life, and so I was logged on, I was there, you know… like women were now a part of history, and I just want to do my part.
That actually leads into my next question. I was wondering what you thought of female musicians- even though they are kind of indie musicians- becoming popular again. There’s Warpaint and Best Coast and Lissie, and there’s a lot of these empowering female artists. Do you think that they’re making a comeback to this kind of music, or has it always been there?
-Debora
I feel a little bit of a comeback happening, and I couldn’t be happier. It’s like, how exciting will that be? I’m waiting for an entirely female rock nation, you know? [laughs] I mean, that sounds sterile, and I don’t mean it like…you know, “yeah let’s do it.” It just sounds …I was so happy when there was all of that sort of upswell of females. I have some Katy Perry songs. I’m not a snob in any way, but when it starts to get to women rocking, I get very serious.
Yeah, there does seem to be a resurgence of sorts going on. I think that there’s not as many of them that are rock and roll acts anymore though. Do you think that they’re there and people just don’t pick up on it and the blogs just don’t want to talk about it?
I’m sure it’s true. I’m sure, you know, it’s not a conspiracy. I’m sure it’s a trend and how trends go. I think there’s also a lot of male acts that don’t get picked up either, but I do think the playing field isn’t quite equal yet, and it may be because there aren’t as many women doing it or maybe there’s not an audience for them because it just isn’t how people want to see women yet or right now. I mean, I used to be able to make leaping statements of like, “this is why it is and this is what it is,” and the older I get …it’s just too complex, and I just…it’s broad generalization. But I feel what you’re feeling- that there’s kind of a… I’ve been reading articles and seen things about young girls, like really young girls still in high school, that are forming bands or playing and kind of breaking stereotypes and that’s always a better weather pattern for me.
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