Insect Aside
Mirah's back with bugs in her system.
; "SIX LEGS GOOD: Mirah and Spectratone International took their inspiration for <i>Share This Place</i>from the")
SIX LEGS GOOD: Mirah and Spectratone International took their inspiration for Share This Placefrom the "Homer of Insects" J. Henri Fabre. (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION) |
Mirah Yom Tov Zeitlyn is a charmer. An indie pop total package, really. She's got this playful, mysterious voice that soars acrobatically over her swooning melodies. Her lyrics are elegant and complex, backed by a formidable storyteller's vocabulary. In fact, Share This Place, Mirah's fifth proper CD on Calvin Johnson's K Records label, is so entrancing, you might never know she's singing about bugs. For real.
Where her previous albums concerned the wants and needs of young lovers and would-be lovers, this one stars glowworms, dung beetles, flies, ants, cicadas and monarch butterflies. Atop pointillist strings and gentle beats provided by Spectratone International, the six sing of instinct and groupthink, desire and duty. Co-produced by Steve Fisk (Nirvana, Soundgarden), Share This Place is engrossing but never gross. It's also not what you'll hear if you check out Mirah's show at the Church on Monday. Instead, The Philly expat is coming round from Portland, backed by Leyna Noel on keyboards and Bryce Kasson on drums, to turn her usually sparse solo favorites into chances to dance. I caught up with Mirah via e-mail.
City Paper: Why insects? Why?
Mirah Yom Tov Zeitlyn: It's only now dawning on me that this whole project might seem a little kooky to those expecting me to always and only sing songs about love and heartbreak with an occasional political spear thrown into the arena. Maybe it's the true result of spending most of a year actually at home instead of being on tour all the time. So it seems that the new album is the project equivalent to that feeling of having to go play a show in your hometown but not being able to leave the house because you're being so domestic, wiping down the counters, checking e-mail, digging around in the garden, spacing out and then finding yourself on a stage in front of hundreds of people.
If you've never experienced this I have to tell you — it's very weird. Share This Place is like that. It's the answer to an unexpected query of "What are you thinking about?" Answer? "Oh, you know, I was just thinking about bugs."
CP: Did you set out to write a "concept album" or "song cycle"? What was the larval stage of Share This Place?
MZ: We planned from the start that the whole album would be insect-themed. We chose each of the six [insects]. I set about my research. It was pretty straightforward.
CP: There's also a lot of Greek mythology in there. Is this stuff you knew or did you dig up your copy of Edith Hamilton when you were writing the lyrics?
MZ: Actually, the story of Psyche and Eros is something that came up while spending some time in counseling, and the presence of the ants in the story allowed me to justify writing out the whole thing in song form for the album. Most of the other myth-centered references in the lyrics are culled from a book which was one of my main reference sources called The Voice of the Infinite in the Small [by Joanne Elizabeth Lauck]. I'm not actually very well-schooled in the Greek myths, though I am more so now. Maybe I'll go down to the library and put a copy of The Greek Way on hold.
CP: Who is J. Henri Fabre and how'd you get turned on to him?
MZ: Lori [Goldston, cellist in Spectratone International] suggested the whole insect theme in the first place after being recommended Fabre by her friend Trace Farrell, a writer. I checked out a bunch of his books from the library and had a great time with them. I really took to his style, kind of whimsical yet scientific, humorous, detailed. Not at all the stodgy stuff you might expect. He's been dubbed by some as the "Homer of Insects."
CP: It's not just the insect motif — this album also sounds different that your previous stuff. There have been hints at this kind of lush, swooning, warmly arranged thing, but never this much at one time. Are your tastes changing?
MZ: Tastes are ever-changing and never static. I would never want to repeat a recording that I've done. Not even Cold Cold Water. It was perfect to have done everything exactly that way — now on to the next! I really feel that way. I'm always excited to get to work with new musicians, new instruments, new themes. This project was very satisfying in that regard. I've never worked with a hand percussionist before, or an oud player.
CP: Did you have to sell Steve Fisk on this kind of album? Did the guy who produced Nirvana and Soundgarden have any qualms about doing something this ... meticulous?
MZ: He and Lori have known each other for a long time, she also worked with Nirvana, and Seattle is really just a big small town for many of the music folks up there. Also, Steve went to Evergreen, as did Calvin Johnson, as did I, and it felt very much in the family to be working together. A lot of times you hear names for a long time without ever having a chance to meet or work with or play a show with the person behind the name so it was really just a great opportunity for all of us to finally be in the same space together working on a project. He was just as thrilled to be involved as we were to have him in the studio with us.
CP: Is it still appropriate to call you an indie pop chanteuse? Was that ever okay?
MZ: That's your job to make up names for people like me like that! Though I would never describe myself that way, I find it neither offensive nor appealing. It makes me sound like I should look differently than I do, like I should always be in a dress or something.
CP: What kind of guitar are you playing these days?
MZ: I'm so not into gear it's kind of embarrassing. I've only ever bought two guitars in my life and the second was just a little parlor-sized Silvertone acoustic that I bought to be my bedroom guitar. I still play my 1965 Gibson ES-120 and love it as much as ever.
CP: Growing up, were you a play-with-the-bugs kid or a bugs-are-gross kid?
MZ: Legend has it, amongst my siblings at least, that I was an eater of slugs, which would put me decidedly in the play-with/eat bugs category. I have since clarified with my brother and sister that I was merely an effective actor and so tricked them into believing that I was swallowing the poor slimy things when, in fact, I was using a clever sleight of hand to hide them until I could return them gently under the rhubarb leaves.
Mon., July 9, 7:30 p.m., $10-$12, with Benjy Ferree and The Ballet, First Unitarian Church, 22nd and Chestnut streets, 866-468-7619, www.r5productions.com.
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