Tomorrow night, local boys Tapes n' Tapes will be celebrating their third album, Outside, at First Avenue. Bring your ear plugs and your dancing shoes - you are going to need both.
In all fairness, I have to admit that my very first First Ave show was a Tapes n' Tapes concert - but they rocked it so hard that I immediately loved both them and the venue. The new album sounds amazing and given past experience, I expect nothing less than a rock out loud show.
There are still tickets available - doors are at 8pm, with guests Oberhofer and Alpha Consumer opening.
You can expect a post-show review here, but for now - Josh Grier, the lead singer, sat down with me right after Outsides's release. It was a great chat - he's genuinely down-to-earth and so passionate about the band & the music. We talked about Prince, Turkish rock, Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books, and being a so-called "blog band."
Michelle: First off, I wanted to thank you for being willing to talk with me. It’s awesome – I’m very much looking forward to the show. I’ve been excited about the release of your new album since 2008, when a friend introduced me to you. I brought both The Loon and Walk It Off with me to Istanbul and all of my Turkish friends went crazy for it.
Josh: That’s amazing – that’s really funny, because I absolutely love Turkish music, especially 70s Turkish music so that’s pretty awesome for me.
Michelle: Who do you listen to, from Turkey, from the 70s?
Josh: Do you know who Erkin Koray is?
Michelle: Yeah!
Josh: I listen to a lot of him and then – I think it’s Selma? I’m trying to think of who else – I’m really bad with names, but there’s like five or six other people whose albums I bought and I just love the music. I don’t know why – one of my buddies got me into it and it’s a slippery slope. I think it’s all pretty awesome.
Michelle: Wow – that’s incredible. Do you speak Turkish?
Josh: No, not at all. For the most part, I have absolutely no idea what anyone is saying. There’s a few songs I’ve looked up online and tried to translate, because I’ve been curious.
Michelle: Ninety-five percent of them are all about love.
Josh: I’ll keep that in mind.
Michelle: The Turks love to sing about love. I listened to The Loon on the way to Troy, so now I can’t hear about Helen of Troy without thinking about that album and Tapes n’ Tapes. But – back to the questions I was planning to ask you. I know that you guys came together in 2003 at Carleton, correct?
Josh: Actually, it wasn’t 2003. I was in Minneapolis – I’d graduated from Carleton. It was me and a buddy, who I did go to Carleton with, and another guy, Matt, who is now our keyboard player – he didn’t go to Carleton – but we all came together in Minneapolis.
Michelle: Ahh, okay. What brought you guys together? How did you guys know each other? I guess a couple of you knew each other through Carleton…
Josh: Yep. Steve, who is my buddy from Carlton, he and I had been in a band together at Carleton. We both moved up to Minneapolis after we graduated. My main reason for moving up here was to try and do music – I wanted to be in a band and just play music and see if I could make that work out. So I talked Steve and Matt into being in the band – it was really me doing some smooth-talking, being like, “Come on guys – you want to be in a band with me. It’ll be awesome.”
Michelle: Did you guys know that you wanted to be called Tapes n’ Tapes right from the beginning?
Josh: Kind of. How I made them believe that we were a legitimate band was that I bought the domain name tapesntapes.com and made up a website for it, so I had it all ready to go and then I was like, “Look – now you guys can’t say no. We have a website. We’re a band. Let’s make this real.”
Michelle: That makes sense to me. I read online that the names Tapes n’ Tapes came from the fact that you guys had tapes and tapes of material that you had just been playing around with. Is that true?
Josh: Yeah, that’s entirely true.
Michelle: Have you ever thought of putting some of that out there for public consumption?
Josh: No. I’ve thought about it, but I’ve thought that it would be a bad idea. A lot of the stuff that we were originally messing around with, that we have on those tapes and tapes, is just late-night, drunken noodling – all of it was totally improvisational. We’d make up a rule for how we’d write the song, so it’d be like, “For this song, I’m going to set the kitchen timer and you can only play these notes and I’m going to play these notes and when the timer goes off, we’re done with the song.” So it’s all really weird – we were just trying out a lot of stuff to entertain ourselves. We did that for a month or two and we ended up having a whole bunch of stuff and some of it was actually good. So we took the stuff we thought was good and focused on that that – the other stuff we can just let nobody ever hear.
Michelle: I suppose that’s fair. What kind of bands have influenced the music that you play?
Josh: Like what bands in general or what kind of bands?
Michelle: Umm…you know – that question is ambiguous. Take it any way you want.
Josh: The main type that influences the type of music that I write is just stuff that I heard when I was really young. When I was a really little kid, I listened a whole lot of classical music because my grandma would have it on all the time. I listened to a whole bunch of music from the 50s, 60s and 70s because that’s what my parents listened to, so a lot of Beatles and Bob Dylan – just classic founders of rock and roll type of stuff. I think that’s the stuff that made the biggest impression on me. After that I just started consuming music.
Michelle: When you make your own music, where do you turn for inspiration for the stories that you tell?
Josh: Most of it is just thoughts in my head. I don’t think I’m necessarily a very good writer but I remember when I was a kid I always really wanted – I loved movies and I really loved watching stories and reading books – but I never thought that I could actually do that, because I couldn’t form a complete sentence. My grammar and spelling are just terrible. So I think that any of those thoughts or ideas or emotions I try to funnel into the songs that I write.
Michelle: What’s new and different about Outside?
Josh: I think that this record there’s a few things that were different. One of the main things was that when we were getting songs together we actually spent some time demoing the songs. In the past, for the most part, I would make up some demos and then we, as a band, would just play the songs together and flush out our parts, but never really record anything and work on it more than us playing live together. On this record, it wasn’t that we took all that much more time with the songs, but we’d play together and then we’d do some basic recording in our practice space and then take it home and listen to it and all come back with ideas about how we wanted to tweak it. The end product, everyone has a little bit more involvement in it and all felt like they had more voice because we’d all be working on it, as opposed to me coming and being like, “This is exactly how I want it and this is how we’re going to do it.”
Michelle: When it comes to songwriting and, in general, the labor of making music – how do you guys divide that?
Josh: I pretty much do all the songwriting. I’ll sit around and play guitar or mess around on keyboards and come up with an idea to get it worked out to a point where I feel comfortable with it and then I’ll bring it into the band, and then we’ll go from there. I think a lot of the songs on this record ended up changing a lot over the course of working on them, which is always a good thing. I think everybody had their voice. “Oh, maybe we should try slowing this down” or “What happens if we take these parts out?’ Just messing around with things a little bit more than we had in the past.
Michelle: What do you want people to take away after listening to Outside? Does the album have a message?
Josh: That’s a really good question. I don’t know if there’s necessarily an overarching message that I want people to walk away with. The only thing I can hope is that somebody will listen to the record and take it for what it is – take it as a sincere piece of music. That’s what we intended. Beyond that, there isn’t necessarily an overarching message. I think that everybody takes away different things from music and that’s one of the things that is so awesome about music – you can interpret things in so many different ways. I think coming down with a heavy hand and saying, well, this is how I want people to feel after listening to this record, or how I want them to think about is really, for me, defeats the purpose. I could tell you how I feel about it, but I don’t want that to affect how other people feel about it.
Michelle: How do you feel about it?
Josh: I feel great about it. There’s some song that make me feel sad when I sing them or make me feel happy or just take me in different places in my mind when we’re playing them and I think it’s good. For me, I like a record to be a mental journey because there’s a lot of different feels and different places that you go and I feel fulfilled or satisfied when I’m at the end of it.
Michelle: Okay.
Josh: I don’t know.
Michelle: No, no – that makes sense. Where does the name Outside come from?
Josh: I had a lot of different ideas for the album title and none of them really were sticking. Basically, I went back through and read the lyrics and thought about the themes on the record and it just seemed to make sense. Outside can be taken in a lot of different ways and I’m all about having ambiguous album titles. There’s a lot of songs on the record that have a feel of wandering around the world or being physically outside and there’s other songs that seem more of a emotional outside. It just seemed to fit a lot of the themes that were on the record.
Michelle: I’m going to go away from the new album for a little bit and talk about more the band as a whole. If you had to pinpoint your most formative moment – the moment you knew that you guys had “arrived,” what would that be?
Josh: That’s really tough. For me, there were a lot of different moments when things started really taking off for us. People started listening and then we started touring – I think when The Loon came out was when things started getting a little crazy. The moment I always come back to as the most surreal was when we played on David Letterman because here’s this show that I grew up watching and I’ve seen so many bands play and on top of that, we were in the Ed Sullivan theater and when you go downstairs there’s all these pictures on the wall of the Beatles playing and the Rolling Stones – all these insane bands that have been on the same stage and that was pretty amazing.
Michelle: Yeah, I can’t imagine what that would be like. And just because I love him – how was it to hear that David Bowie loved “Insistor?”
Josh: That was definitely pretty amazing – it was pretty awesome. I don’t ever think that anyone else really listens to our music, especially other bands. So when someone who I grew up thinking was the coolest thing ever – that there’s even proof that he listened to our music was like, “Wow! Holy sh*t!” After that, it’s like you made it.
Michelle: What is the story behind “Insistor?” Because I have listened to it hundreds of times and every time I listen to it, I think something different.
Josh: Well, that’s good. Now I don’t want to ruin it for you. Honestly, I feel the same way. I think about different things too every time we play it. One of the things that I think is really cool about music is that you can tell stories that don’t always go the same way, even though it’s the same song. It’s like a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure.
Michelle: Yeah – your music is very much like a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure. Every time I listen to one of your albums, it totally depends on what time of year it is, or whether or not I’ve had a good day or a bad day, so I think that’s a great way to describe your music. You may have already answered this next question, because we talked about the David Letterman show, but you guys have played a ton of live shows. I’ve seen you a handful of times already. What’s the most memorable live show you’ve played? Is there one that really sticks in your mind – when you walked off stage, you just thought to yourself, “I can’t believe that just happened.”
Josh: There have been a lot actually. It’s the venues that we’ve played in – I, myself, grew up going to shows and reading about bands playing at venues, so I’ve always been – I wouldn’t say an academic about music, because I don’t really remember a lot of things – but there are certain places in music history and when we’ve played shows at those places…of course, the Bowery was really amazing, or the Fillmore in San Francisco. It blows my mind, how many cool things we’ve gotten to do. It’s really hard for me to pick out just one because they are all things where I’m just like, “Wow – these are all things that I remember reading about and seeing videos of and now here we are.” I definitely feel fortunate.
Michelle: You mentioned a lot of venues – do you have a favorite venue to play?
Josh: If it’s in town, in Minneapolis, First Avenue is hands-down – it’s amazing, with all the history with Prince and Purple Rain. I think that’s got to be at the top of the list for me. But outside of town, there are a lot of venues that we’ve been at, it’s really hard to pick just one. One of them that would probably be a surprise to a lot of people is the Bottletree in Birmingham, Alabama.
Michelle: Really? What makes the Bottletree so incredible?
Josh: The venue is run by – I hope I don’t screw this up – it’s run by one of the guys who used to be in Man or Astroman. It’s his venue and it’s very band-friendly. The vibe in there is really great and everyone who works there is really friendly. It’s just a great experience to go there, so I think that’s why it stands out for me. Every time we go through there, it’s like, “All right, we get to play the Bottletree again – this is awesome!”
Michelle: I have family down there – next time I’m home, it sounds like I have to take a trip to the Bottletree.
Josh: Definitely. And eat there – the food is amazing.
Michelle: All right. Eat at the Bottletree. So – the last time I saw you play was at the Lowertown Music Festival, which was an incredible day. Including this new album – do you have a favorite song to play live? Not necessarily based on crowd reception, but just one that you love putting out there live.
Josh: I don’t know that I could just pick one. I know this sounds hokey, but the songs end up being like your kids and you can’t really pick a favorite one. It all just depends on the show. There are some shows were a certain song will be amazing and then the next show, that song will be okay but another song, we’ll be like, “Oh, we totally nailed that.” It depends on all of us in the band – there are times we it seems like we lock in really well and I think those times end up being the best songs for whatever show.
Michelle: You guys tour a fair amount – what do you like about being on the road?
Josh: I think, for me, the best part about it is just the fact that we do get to play so many shows and we just play music so much. That’s the reason why all of us are in a band to begin with, because we absolutely love playing music. So the fact that we get to go do that for two months at a time, it’s really the best job in the world.
Michelle: When you’re on the road, what do you miss about the Twin Cities? Obviously, it’s probably the snow, but you can feel free to answer with something else, if you wish.
Josh: Obviously, I think we all miss our family and friends, because it’s always fun to share the experience with the people that you care about. Beyond that, in winter time, it’s hard to come up with the things that I miss, because when you head down south for the winter, it’s pretty nice. There’s not much, “Oh, I wish that we were back freezing in Minnesota.” But in the summertime, or the spring or the fall, then it’s definitely more difficult. There are the lakes – just all the amazing stuff about being outside in summertime – the months that you can, when there’s no snow on the ground.
Michelle: I’ve never understood why Minnesotans take summer vacations outside the state. I guess I understand if you have children in school, but if you have no other reason – the month to leave is not June.
Josh: Yeah, exactly. That is the last month that you want to be out of town. You’re going to stick around for all this other stuff, but you’re not going to be here when it’s not too humid and not too cold?
Michelle: Exactly. So, what do you think is your biggest challenge as a band right now?
Josh: I think that one of our biggest challenges isn’t one that’s musical. It’s getting people to listen to our music as its own thing. The way that we came up and gained notoriety through the internet, through blogs and stuff, I think a lot of people want to be like, “Oh – they’re a blog band.” That’s fine, but at the same time – I agree that we gained a lot of attention initially because blogs liked to talk about us, but we were a band long before that and we’ll be a band long after that. So when people say that, I feel as though they aren’t really listening to our music. I think that’s the biggest challenge for us to overcome – that we are only this hyped band from the blogosphere. We play music that we love and that’s the only thing that we are trying to do, make music that we love and not be somebody else or do anything else like that. We seriously love playing music and please take that into account. Then if you hate us, that’s awesome and if you love us, that’s great. Just take us as a band as opposed to anything else.
Michelle: What do you want to be doing ten years from now?
Josh: Ideally, I’d still be writing music and playing and putting out records. But if that doesn’t work out – I think I’ll always be writing music and putting out records. It just may not always be for my job. At some point, maybe I’ll be a chef, maybe I’ll go to grad school. Really – ideally what I’d be doing ten years from now is that I’d be an astronaut, but I know that there’s absolutely no way that’s going to happen.
Michelle: The only reason that might be a stretch is simply because they’ve defunded NASA. I’m sure otherwise you’d have every probability of being an astronaut.
Josh: The problem is that my eyesight isn’t perfect and I don’t know that I have the physical stamina to be an astronaut, but I’m still going to keep that as a dream.
Michelle: Are you a good cook?
Josh: People tell me that I’m not a bad cook.
Michelle: That’s a start. Finally, because I do write about live music in the Twin Cities, I like to ask – what the best live show you’ve attended?
Josh: The most amazing live show that I have ever seen was when I saw Prince at First Avenue, when he did those shows on 07/07/07.
Michelle: Did you go to all three?
Josh: I went to the Target Center show and the First Ave show, I didn’t go to the Macy’s show. The Target Center show was great – he played all his hits. He played “Purple Rain” and I got teary-eyed, it was amazing. His First Ave show – I don’t know that he even played a single song that I knew, it’s wasn’t the big hits, but it was overwhelming, to be so close to Prince, to be at First Avenue watching him. It was a pretty amazing experience. I don’t know if I’ll ever top that. I’ve seen a whole bunch of other amazing shows, but that was the pinnacle – a perfect storm.
Michelle: To wrap it up – I always ask my friends what they want me to ask people and the question that always seems to win, that they are just dying to know – and it makes no sense, but in a hypothetical battle, who do you think would win – a pirate or a ninja?
Josh: I think that a ninja would win. I know pirates can be spry and stuff, but I think that ninjas have a much more versatile array of trickery and potential moves. Now in a game of Battleship, who would win – a pirate or a ninja – I think that would raise some more questions.
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