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A Conversation with Jon Langford (continued)
PM: You're a very political soul to say the least. What do you think about Obama for president?
JL: We need a black guy in the White House. It's about time.
PM: Yeah.
JL: It's as simple as that for me, being an outsider. I think it would be a fantastic thing. After eight years of God knows what--disaster this country's had, I think.
PM: We barely survived it.
JL: Vietnam was a disaster and America's head went down the rabbit hole when Vietnam was going on, and we've just done the same thing again. We've learned nothing from history, by the arrogance of these people that think that they know best and they don't know. Really, they know nothing. I think someone like Obama--people say that he's not experienced. Thank God. Let's have a next president who isn't experienced.
PM: Maybe he'll do something different.
JL: Get anyone off any street corner and make them president, and they would have done a better job than Bush.
PM: Suppose it goes the other way, Democratically speaking, and Hillary gets the nod. What would you think about that?
JL: A woman as president. That's not so bad, either. [laughs]
PM: No.
JL: But I have a bit of a problem with the Clintons. You've got this grey haired guy looming in the background, and Hillary looks like she's got a lot of people telling her to be nicer than she probably really is.
PM: And it just doesn't come to her very easily.
JL: No. And I think they got this--Bill Richardson said it the other night. Why he went for Obama was, it's this feeling that the Clintons feel like they're entitled to it. There's this sense of entitlement, and no one's entitled to it.
PM: Absolutely.
JL: She voted for the war as well, and I think that was an act of cowardice at the time, you know?
PM: Yup.
JL: It was an act of political cowardice, and I don't like that. I would vote for Barack any day.
PM: You've been in the States now a long time. Is Austin or Chicago where you make your home?
JL: I'm in Chicago.
PM: America's flawed politics notwithstanding, has it been a good home for you?
JL: Chicago's been phenomenal. It's just very, very different than where I come from. The old myth of America as the land of opportunity--it's been kind of true for me. I arrived in Chicago already knowing the town really well; I'd played here a lot already, and had a big support group of people here.
PM: Wow.
JL: My wife is from here, so it's been--it's not easy on the level of trying to make a living being an artist and a musician, but I can't think of anywhere better to have tried to do that. I didn't really know I was trying to do that. I was just scratching by, and happened--one day I ended up in Chicago and enthusiastic. The club owners, the record labels--there's a lot of support. It's probably similar in other cities. I don't wanna be chauvinistic about Chicago. But it seems like there's a lot of space to do things here. When I first arrived here, there was definitely something happening. Bands I met here are people who came through here and stayed here--Touch and Go, Bloodshot, Fang Billions our agent--which was building up at that time. We're really lucky. We've got good relationships and no contracts with anyone. That's the funny thing.
PM: Really?
JL: Through all those years of lawyers' bills and crap, I've been working probably I think the most productive period in my life for the last fifteen years without any contracts other than just--handshake and a smile. It really works.
PM: Unbelievable. You've made a boatload of records with your three bands and put out a groundbreaking book of writings and artwork. Are there other things you aspire to do? Film or acting or scoring or something else you may not yet have sunk your teeth into?
JL: Well, you know what? I never really aspired to do anything much. [laughs] I seem to do things and then I kind of fall into it, which is a strange career model, but it seems to be the way it works. Every time I packed up a load of slides of my work and sent them off to a gallery that I thought would be a good place to show them, they always just tell me to fuck off.
PM: [laughs]
JL: Then a phone call comes saying, "You wanna show at the Museum of the Southwest in Midland, Odessa, November of 2009?" It's like, yeah, I could do that.
PM: Wow.
JL: Things keep popping up and it's really, really exciting. At the moment--I just did a thing last night which was a reading of a play that somebody's made of this album that Bloodshot put out a few years ago. A lot of the imagery from that is in the Nashville Radio book. Some journalist reviewed it and said it was an alt-country Ziggy Stardust. I was floored.
PM: Wow. Who made the music?
JL: It's gathered around a subject, but it's not really a rock opera. It's not really a specific story or a narrative. But this guy Mark Gerino in Chicago, he took it and he asked me if he could just take the songs and see what he could make of it. So he's used the imagery from the paintings and the content of the songs, and he's turned it into this--I don't know what you call it--like a musical, basically--a play where people burst into song. There's a band on stage and paintings come to life and stuff, singing.
PM: Crazy.
JL: Five-headed monsters stumble around and tumbleweeds blow across the stage thing. It's pretty fuckin' cool. [laughs] I don't know how they're gonna do it yet. We just did it last night. I sung all the songs 'cause the actor didn't know them yet. That's a pretty interesting project.
PM: Can a ballet be far behind?
JL: A valet?
PM: [laughs] a ballet.
JL: Oh, a ballet. I need valet parking--
PM: Oh, jeez, I hope not. I could use a valet--
JL: It would be great. I'd love to have somebody do the ballet.
PM: How about a frickin' roadie, yeah? [laughs] Well, Jon, I appreciate your time today. It's lovely to meet you on the phone. Like I say, we dig this new record at Schuba's, and long may the Wacos reign.
JL: Thank you very much. I'm glad you like the record. I'm glad people in Nashville like it. I have a lot of fun when I come to Nashville.
PM: Yeah, you've got a lot of supporters here, and we hope you come back to town very soon.
JL: I'm a big Grimey's and Basement fan.
PM: Absolutely. I saw a video of you at Grimey's. I must have been out of town or I would have been there--with Paul Burch, one of our favorites, playing guitar.
JL: Yeah. His band's Marty and Jim, who are just fantastic.
PM: Well, I hope I catch you next time you're in town and meet you in person.
JL: Okay, Frank. Nice to talk to you.
listen to clips print interview (pdf)
jonlangford.de myspace.com/wacobrothers
bloodshotrecords.com waco brothers page at bloodshot
langford artwork for sale at yard dog the mekons' myspace
That set of six pictures of Jon at the very beginning, on the setup page, the ones that look like they might be stills from some video interview are, in fact, just that. The interview is over at brightcove.tv, an entertaining three minutes or so. See that video here.
