Q&A: Interview with Brian Cook of These Arms Are Snakes
Pitch contributor Saby Reyes-Kulkarni recently caught up with current These Arms Are Snakes and Russian Circles (and former Botch) bassist Brian Cook. An edited transcript of that interview follows.
These Arms Are Snakes, from left: Ryan Frederiksen, Chris Common, Brian Cook, Steve Snere
The Pitch: You like collaborating with other people, and These Arms Are Snakes likes to keep things fresh from album to album. What else are you into, creatively?
Brian Cook: I don't know. I kinda like doing more simple, traditional song stuff from time to time because I don't feel like there's any pressure with that kind of stuff. I have a weakness for simple Americana-type stuff. But I'd also really like to do something obnoxiously ugly again. Even though both Russian Circles and These Arms Are Snakes are pretty abrasive, something that's not melodic at all, really brash and ugly would be really fun.
When you were in the band Roy with Dave Verellen from Botch, an interviewer quoted you as saying, "When you spend years and years playing loud music, touring with loud bands, and attending hundreds or hardcore and metal shows, you reach a point where you need variety or you get totally burnt out." How do you still get excited about playing and listening to heavy music?
Especially around the time that Botch was really active -- I guess at our peak -- I was trying to stay very involved in the local hardcore scene. I hate to say it, because it sounds so negative, but at a point it just stops being something that you do because you love it, and you do it because you feel this sense of obligation. You have to keep track of what's going on and who the new bands are and what's going on at certain labels -- all the stuff that makes hardcore cool because it's more community based.
But when you're in a band that tours more, your worldview expands. So all of a sudden, it's not "I have to keep track of what's going in Seattle." It's like "I have to keep track of the whole US." To try and stay abreast of what's going on in all these cities with these people that you've gotten to know, you sort of feel like you don't give anyone attention anymore. That's how people get burned out a lot of the time. So for us, rather than driving around listening to shit that sounded like the stuff we were doing, we'd listen to Belle and Sebastian or Neutral Milk Hotel or Bob Dylan -- whatever was the antithesis of that.
How much longer do you anticipate that you'll keep this touring lifestyle up?
I have no idea. I can't imagine ever not doing it. But I can't imagine doing it in the capacity that I do it now for another ten years.
You've said that you want TAAS to progress dramatically between albums, and that you don't ever want to tread water artistically. How difficult is it for the band to agree on how the sound should evolve?
The handful of time times we've tried to talk about what we want to achieve on the front end of things, it didn't work. We just don't seem to operate that way. The one advantage to the fact that we tour a lot and that we have to cram all of our writing into these short blocks of time right before we go into the studio is that it puts these long gaps between our creative period. It inevitably winds up that we move away from what we've done in the past to a certain degree. The next time we do a record, I would like to see an even larger leap into another style.
Have you said something like that each time?
I feel like I do. [Laughing:] Damnit, this time I mean it. With this last record, I feel like we've finally written the record I've always wanted to do. With [second album] Easter, we wanted to make something that was way more about crafting something in the studio and doing something epic and sprawling and kind of out there. Then we realized that that was at odds with what we are as a live band. This time [with new album Tail Swallower and Dove], we worked it into something that worked in the live setting, worked on the record, and just reflected where we were at.
It sounds like it comes together naturally, and that the time constraint prevents you from over-thinking things.
I admire people that are able to establish a game plan and then go in, work and re-work, and finely tune their vision. So that they're able to craft something that's completely pre-meditated. [Laughs.] I've never had any luck doing that.
You've said that you hate it when bands disregard innovation, and that you also hate it when bands disregard tradition.
We don't want to feel like we have to re-define music when we put out an album. There's enough people trying to do that and failing miserably at it. Being innovative for the sake of being innovative is a pretty risky venture. The whole disavowing-tradition thing is really just a recent development in art. I think Animal Collective's a great band, but the way they try and flaunt themselves is bullshit. You guys sound like the Beach Boys and you use samples. That's cool, but the way band like that present themselves seems really pretentious and false to me.
Before you guys made the new album, you said that you and Steve [Snere, vocals] were talking about how you wanted it to sound like Can meets Wolf Eyes. Then after the album was out, you said that you had been wanting to move away from what you called "ADD rock" and that you were inspired by how Krautrock bands can make engaging music out of droning, simple patters. How different than the album end up being than what you guys thought you were getting into?
I think Steve and I are the two guys in the band that are the bigger record nerds. Like, 'Oh man, we gotta do this shit because it's so trippy.' We're the guys that want to keep moving it more and more out there. Whereas Ryan [Frederiksen, guitar] and Chris [Common, drums] are like 'no, we've got to keep this structured in a more basic rock format.' They think we've got to be realistic. While Steve and I are hearing Can and Wolf Eyes -- obnoxious textures, but really simple patterns over and over again -- we can sit there and talk about that, but when it actually comes to being in the practice space, we have to figure out how to take those elements and put them into a template that's more in mind with traditional punk music, I guess. Right now, Steve's like "fuck it, I want to sound like Suicide; I want to be as minimal as possible and extrapolate on these really basic soundscapes." Hey, I'm right on board, but I know at the end of the day, when you've got four people working towards that, it's not going to sound anything like that.
-- Saby Reyes-Kulkarni
TAAS plays Tuesday, February 24, at the Jackpot, with Darker My Love and All the Saints.
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