Artist Interview: FOX Japan

Interview by Jon Sebastian.

FOX Japan is an indie rock band from West Virginia. The first record I heard of theirs (And Now This!) reminded me what it really means for music to be infectious. A week after hearing it, I literally had trouble getting to sleep because I had the chorus to A Nursing Home stuck in my head on infinite repeat. Or was it the verse? Or was it the pre-chorus?

See, that’s one of their tricks. Upon first listen, it’s hard to tell whether you’re hearing a verse or a chorus or a pre-chorus, because what you’re hearing in every case is too damn catchy and big to be anything other than the chorus. It has to be the chorus. But then the REAL chorus kicks in, and you can’t believe they’ve topped themselves in the same song, but they just did.

Most bands who stumble across hooks this good handle them with forceps, place them carefully into track 2 or 3 or whatever their single is going to be, and post a huge flashing neon sign nearby that says BIG CHORUS RIGHT HERE!!

FOX Japan uses the same hooks so liberally and so nonchalantly, they make it look easy. Like they have a tree in their backyard that grows hooks. They’ve been here before, and they act like it. They didn’t happen to stumble upon them, they’re not strangers to them, and they didn’t crap their pants when they found them - it’s just what they do.

I recently interviewed lead singer Charlie Wilmoth via email.

As a songwriter, what are your biggest influences music-wise?

I think our instrumental style owes a little to the Pixies and Pavement. Also, for our first couple of records I was interested in the idea of writing these really jagged, nervous, topical pop songs like Devo did–”An Investigative Sentence” is probably the best example. I think after that we got a little more comfortable stretching things out.

Also, hip-hop has been a really big influence on the way I write lyrics. I tend to like lyrics that are very specific and direct, and am probably more willing than most rock lyricists to cram lots of syllables into each line, the way an MC does. All four of us were really into the Dismemberment Plan as kids, and I think we liked that they were an indie rock band who said what they meant (often with tons of words, like us) and tried to integrate lots of styles besides rock into their music. That last part sounds obvious now, in 2009, but there was a time in the 1990s and early ’00s when indie rock mostly seemed to be talking to itself.

Your lyrics portray strong convictions about politics, religion and society. What are your biggest influences lyrically?

Hip-hop. Also a couple of more obscure ’90s indie rock bands called Nothing Painted Blue and the Loud Family that were both really good with words. I really like the specificity of Xiu Xiu’s lyrics. I was into Bad Religion as a teenager and some of that probably crept in even though until recently I’d totally forgotten about them. Our political side may come more from Gang of Four, though. “Thank You” was influenced by Denis Johnson’s fiction, even though the lyrics to that song are about 95% true. I also get ideas from cultural critics like Neil Postman and political blogs like Eschaton.

In general, though, I think FOX Japan’s next record is going to be less pointedly political. There’s one really mean song about Glenn Beck, but politically, most of the targets aren’t as obvious as they used to be, and I’m frankly kind of happy about that, both because I like having competent leadership and because we were probably running out of creative ways to say that Donald Rumsfeld is a dickwad, you know? So I think the next record will probably seem more inward-looking.

I still don’t think my personal tribulations are all that interesting, but there are a lot of more personal issues that I can write about that say something broader about what it means to be an American now. (Which sounds extremely pretentious, but whatever.)

Like, for example, how we’re raised to believe we can do anything if we try, but when we grow up we find that isn’t true even if we’ve worked hard. (Jean Twenge’s “Generation Me” is a good book about that.) Or how to try to say something important when most of our day-to-day conversation drips with self-awareness and narcissism and irony. Or how to have meaningful relationships or friendships when everybody’s following their careers all over the place.

Two of your three band mates are your brothers. Could you talk a little bit about how you guys grew up together to form a band?

Our drummer Pete and I have played together since we were little kids. We made a makeshift drum set out of toy percussion instruments, tin cans and a cardboard box (which we used as the bass drum), and I taught him how to make some basic beats. We recorded well over 1,000 songs in the course of a couple of years (nearly all of them terrible, obviously), which convinced our parents we were serious about it, so they bought us a drum set and a 4-track. Meanwhile, all three of us were playing in the orchestra and jazz bands at school–I played a bunch of string instruments, Pete played percussion and Sam played upright bass.

I finished college and went to grad school to study contemporary classical music, and forgot about the band for a while. At that point, I was just writing pop songs on my own, and writing and performing classical music for school. Then I turned 25 and realized that if I wanted to make rock music, I had better get going. So FOX Japan reconvened, first with Andrew Slater (the only non-Wilmoth) as the bassist, and then with Sam as the bassist and Andrew as guitarist.

What is your writing process like as a band?

I write the chords and the melodies at home (I live in San Diego, and the rest of the band lives in West Virginia), usually over the course of several months, and then send the band rough MP3s of me singing with made-up lyrics. I then fill in as many of the lyrics as I can and I fly back to West Virginia, where we practice ridiculously hard for four or five days before going on tour.

It’s a terrible system, but it works for us because we all grew up playing classical music, in which rehearsals are much more efficiently run than they typically are in rock. Also, I try to show up in rehearsal with a pretty specific idea of what I want to have happen. And since three of us are brothers and Andrew has been a family friend for ten or twelve years now, there’s very little of the passive-aggressive B.S. that happens in lots of rock bands. We’re all very quick to say when something isn’t working, and to listen to criticism from each other.

What’s the last new album to come out that you really liked?

Andrew and I like Fever Ray’s new album. I also like the new record by a Pittsburgh band called Meeting of Important People, who we’re playing with in a couple weeks. They write some amazing pop songs.

What do you like to do for fun besides play music?

I write about music for a couple of publications, and I also have my own website about baseball. I read a lot. All four of us play poker. And we all like situational puzzles, which are really fun to play when you’ve got a long drive home after a show and you’re listening to something really creepy, like Scott Walker. As for our careers, I teach music classes, Andrew works in a hospital, Sam works in mental health, and Pete is in grad school for social work.

As a music fan, if you could spend one month playing in any other band, what band would it be and why?

Wow, that’s an interesting question. Maybe the Talking Heads, circa Stop Making Sense. I could sing backup and play percussion. Or Joanna Newsom’s band? I play violin and viola and it would be fun to see what kinds of fiddle parts I could come up with for those songs.

What’s your favorite FOX Japan song and why?

There’s one that’s going to be on our next record called “Maybe I Won’t” that has a huge percussion break that’s really fun to play, and the rest of the song has a weird, ritualistic feel that I think everyone in the band likes. Of the ones we’ve released so far, I’m pretty proud of “Divorce,” but we got tired of playing it live. Really, I like any song where I can gesture and move around, but unfortunately I have to play guitar most of the time.

What do you think is the best way for people to get into your band: by listening to a cd, or by going to a show?

We’re just beginning to understand the finer points of recording and mixing, and are just now getting to the point where we’re beginning to be able to explain to an engineer what we want. I think our next album, which is being recorded by Brian Spragg and which should come out early next year, is going to sound awesome. We’re pretty happy with the way the last record sounds, but the next one is going to be much cooler. Until it comes out, I’d say the best way to hear us is to come to a show. We’re a good live band, if we do say so ourselves.