Q&A: Aaron Hemphill of Liars

We went to a Sixers game and then went to some all night pretzel place where they bake pretzels and curse you out, which I really liked. I like the people of Philly, they're real gritty. I like it. I like gritty.

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Q&A: Aaron Hemphill of Liars

POSTED: Thursday, July 26, 2012, 3:00 PM

Filed Under: Music Show

(Zen Sekizawa)

The Brooklyn band plays Union Transfer tonight.

Twelve years into the game and the Liars are still pretty hard to nail down. But their most recent release, the dark, dreamy WIXIW (pronounced “wish you”), encapsulates the Brooklyn band’s heavily fluctuating style better than any album so far. The Liars are out on tour right now — and in Philly tonight. I chatted with Aaron Hemphill (guitar, percussion, synth) last week, as he was on the road to Milwaukee.

City Paper: You’re taking a fun little loop across the country, up into Canada for a minute, swooping back down again and then blasting off to the UK to finish up the tour. What comes after that? Will you have some down time to recoup from all that traveling?

Aaron Hemphill: We might take a little bit of a break in December, tentatively, but the way it generally pans out is that we basically end up working through the time we were supposed to have a break. Which is fine, not an issue.

CP: But the tour is going well so far? You set out July 5th, you’ve been on the road pretty non stop since, huh?

AH: I think it’s great, I mean it’s kind of tough but I think it sometimes depends on how your home situation is. But right now I think my life is pretty well experienced with just touring and working on music. For me, I enjoy being on tour right now and I enjoy playing and working every day, meeting people. So I’m really, really happy right now.

CP: You’ve toured pretty extensively for most of your albums, pretty heavily throughout Europe, what’s the overall experience of all the tours over the years?

AH: Angus [Angus Andrew, vox/guitar] and I have been together forever. We’ve done tons of touring and I think it’s very important to provide a sort of alternative version to the album and create an experience for people who resonate with your albums. Whether it could be disastrous or it could be better than the record, I don’t know. It’s out of our control, really. I think that appearance and that situation of the live show is very important.

I find it really mind blowing that our music warrants people driving so far just to see us. You meet people who have just driven for eight hours to see a show, and I used to do that when I was younger, back and forth from San Francisco to L.A. to see a show, I think it’s really amazing that that’s what happens. That people drive that far and then come up and talk to us.

A show is situational of the time. For me it emphasizes the risk you take with live performance. We’re so appreciative of the people that come out and the fact that they’re there to see something that connects them more through a feeling. Really, it’s out of control. I think bigger, especially creative things, should have that element where people just let it be out of control.

CP: What were your experiences like the last few times you played in Philly? I know you’ve played at the Church a few times.

AH: I remember the last time we were in Philadelphia, we were stuck there in the winter and Angus got the flu really bad. We went to a Sixers game and then went to some all night pretzel place where they bake pretzels and curse you out, which I really liked. I like the people of Philly, they’re real gritty. I like it. I like gritty.

CP: Haha. Gritty. That’s a good word for us. We’re excited to have you. Anyway, tell me a bit about the progression you guys have made from your early formative days of finding your percussionists in wanted-ads to now having rhythms at the central part of the sound with all the experimental noises that have been piled on over the years.

AH: We’ve always had a focus on the rhythms, and Angus and I, before we found those two other members from the wanted ads, we made a basically finished demo of what the first album was to be with he and I playing drums on the recordings. In general we always write individually where we play all the instruments and you have to start with the drums and then things make sense afterwards. We’ve always sort of had a very natural fondness for rhythms. In the early days we made even had a very unique rhythmic pattern, then all this music that we layered on over the years made it even more interesting. I think it’s more about just whatever we’re interested in. Like I think after the third album we became more interested in vocal melodies or instrumental progression but it’s all just focused on the times, whatever we’re more interested in and trying to express in that moment.

CP: Which album was the most fun to make?

AH: The most carefree, fun album to make was probably our first. I can tell you that WIXIW was very hard, very emotionally draining, but it doesn’t mean that it wasn’t extremely rewarding. So many of our albums are so different, and we were so different at that place and time that you just can’t rank the experiences. The way we feel about our music is that if we anticipate too much what’s next then it takes away focus from what we’re creating right now, what we’re most excited about.

CP: Tell me some more about the emotional drain of this past album? Why more so than the others?

AH: I would rather stress that this last album has been most rewarding than it was draining. It was that too, sure, the collaborative process that we had was very challenging and scary, and again, at the same time, it was the most rewarding. I would say it’s been far more of a positive than anything.

CP: What are three career goals you once had that you’ve now been able to accomplish?

AH: I think making this record. Second would be making this record with Angus and Julian, and then just driving into Milwaukee right now. I don’t want to sound in any way ironic or like i’m giving you some typical answers, this is genuinely how we feel about things. We’re the type of people that just want to be appreciative of right now.

CP: So I suppose I shouldn’t ask if Liars are for life or if there’s ever talk of what’s down the line, or if you’ll, (dare I ask), ever speak of how long you’ll continue making music?

AH: For us and how we see the work and tend to think, considering an end is something that would never come up. So debating if ten years down the road it we’ll still be doing the same thing? I don’t know. We really don’t think about that or think of the future in that way. I’m not really thinking about how good our 8th album is going to be or will I still be playing guitar in four years. That’s like, guaranteed. Making a good song is a guarantee for us, we’ve been doing this for twelve years. I’m just not the type of person who likes to plan things in that way. I’m just really, really excited about right now.

Liars play tonight, Thu., July 26, $15, 9 p.m., Union Transfer, 1024 Spring Garden St. More info here.

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Featuring everything from event roundups to concert reviews and sex talk, City Paper's Critical Mass is a space for off-the-wall coverage of Philly's A&E scene.

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