by Brad Rose

i was born in karachi, pakistan and was placed in a bottle & thrown to sea & washed up on the shores of ugly/beautiful north jersey before i could figure out what was going on...................not much music was played in the house, so it wasn’t until i picked up the trombone for concert band in 5th grade that playing music seemed like something to do. pretty quickly i figured i’d enjoy hitting things as opposed to blowing in them so i switched to trap drums. at some point someone placed a guitar in my hands, which as i remember coincided with an unhealthy obsession with the misfits/samhain, so i must have been 13 or so. the guitar’s been there ever since. i’m 31 now.

man, that’s a tough question.......................one record? that got me interested in the “kind of” music i make now?...........................i couldn’t really divorce every/all thing i’ve ever heard, seen, etc. leading up to the now from anything else...........................i could pinpoint buying ‘trout mask replica’ and ‘a love supreme’ when i was 16 or so as heading me in whatever direction i’m in now............................i’d also have to mention sun ra’s ‘cosmic tones for mental therapy’, ravi shankar’s ‘in new york’, sandy bull's 'e pluribus unum', and fred mcdowell's 'amazing grace'.............ghost’s ‘second time around’ for sure.................................also, tons of the jazz/folk/what-not on the e.s.p./vanguard labels, and siltbreeze (esp. un) a bit later on........................there’s tons of shit.......................still spend time trying to find those moments, and they’re still there, thank god.

life, living, art.........you know...................my girlfriend, my friends............................. love......................you know....................

sure..........self release full length ‘between two skies’ and solo guitar ‘towards the night’....................just put out a cd-r of guitar/vox improvs called ‘yahan aur wahan’......................forthcoming full length on time-lag called ‘century of moonlight’.................on the horizon, just finished another full length called ‘the vertigo of dawn’ that time-lag’s putting out on wax which i’m psyched about.

by the way, much respect & thanks to nemo and the sweethearts of volcanic tongue

i would amend the question to ‘what role it plays in my life?’, in which it’s omnipresent. i vacillate between the world’s coming to an end (which, unless you live under a rock ((or you’re a fucking moron)) it’s impossible to not think at least once in awhile) and that there’s more infinite beauty in the world that will never be squashed by the current powers that hold sway......................i don’t know, it’s simple shit, like “am i hungry or not hungry?”..............you know what i mean? there’s always a give and take, and obviously one can’t exist without the other. the sufi writings on music (on by proxy. LIFE) lay out a pretty convincing argument on how everything’s pretty well interconnected. i think it’s pretty safe to say tension in a pretty necessary adjunct to living.................. or something............................

this kind of relates to the above question.........................when i was a kid the threat of nuclear war was always like the worst thing that could happen, not just having nuclear capabilities, but the actual mushroom cloud, that threat was like the final exclamation, you know what i mean?.................and when i was growing up, that was always in the back of my head, like “things are bad, there’s some really bad shit going down right now, but they’re not THAT bad”, you follow me?..................but the thing is now, that horror that always was on the horizon is so in the present.............................it’s happening................................for all the amazing things that america had done, produced, etc (of which i think there are MANY) there’s so much horrific shit that our government has done and is doing right now that needs to be acknowledged in a serious way. personally, i have a lot of family in pakistan & in the states and that’s a concern......................and a source of anger & sadness & lots of other things...............to be more concise, i make the things i do for a number of reasons, many of which are personal, but i will say, it’s a big fuck you to certain powers that be that say my voice doesn’t matter & it’s how honor my family (extended or otherwise) in the only way i know how.......................

well, i wouldn't really say that's the only reason i do stuff (though i don't think that's what you're saying)...........i'd rather not dwell too much on the why/how i do things and just be immersed in the doing.......i mean, in a way i don't really have any statement about what i do at all, it's there in the music, you know?.......i don't know if it's any deeper level of communication than just like talking to someone on the street, you follow me? it seems like a lot people have things in their lives that are important and crucial to living and making art is just part of my life in the way that reading is and laying on the couch listening to records is or cooking or whatever and they're things i do all the time......................i guess i wouldn't want to catagorize it as a release, it's just part of living, part of life, you know?

i've always had a pretty difficult time being grounded in reality so i guess i can't really blame anyone for not dealing with it................at the same time i think it's pretty important to look around at what's going on around you and also what's happening beyond your own little universe..............and it can seem pretty fucking overwhelming & intimidating, at least for me.............and i've come to realize that, you know, at the end of the day it's how you can make a world for yourself and your loved ones which is really important.......is it enough, i don't know..............

it's amazing...........you know..........especially since i think a lot of it's pretty dark..............i do like that it kind of makes it feel like and give and take, like it's not really done until someone else hears it..............i mean i just make stuff that i want to hear, and that'll make my girfriend smile, and when other people respond to it, it blows my mind.................

well, i was living in seattle for about 6 years or so and cultivating a way of living that wasn't really agreeing with me............and feeling pretty distracted from what i should be doing, though i was playing music a lot there and playing shows..............and my girlfriend was feeling the same way, so we decided to take off and spend this past summer on her family farm and just make art...............and it was killer, you know, just wake up and drink some coffee and listen to shirley collins and then get to work.............it certainly allowed me to become completely & blissfully out of the loop, though i wasn't really in the loop to begin with i guess................i also spend as little time on a computer as possible, so it did feel pretty isolated............i mean, i'm from new jersey, man, the country was pretty scary at first.......but, you know, there's great music coming out from everywhere, i think it probably depends more on the individual and how one responds to your environment as an individual.....though i think i tend to agree with you.........also, the cities you mentioned are so expensive that just seems like it'd be a drag..........but we're actaully moving to portland oregon in a week so we'll see what happens next.

sent him copies of both cd-rs to see if he'd like to distribute them, and he was psyched on them and we started communicating via email...........he offered to put the next couple of things out & was like , "uh OKAY"................nemo's a good piece of magic for sure...........

i'd rather not get into the specifics though your repsonse to it is killer & the way the words went together visually was part of it .............

everyone should do themselves a favor and read 'against nature' by huysmans and read cesar vallejo's 'poemas humanos'.......and listen to as many shirley collins and ali akbar khan records as you can get your hands on...............thanks for playing....................