Drummer talks lacklustre bookers and promoters in North America
Darlene Shrugg has been hailed as a true Torontonian supergroup, and for good reason. As the folks from Kazoo!, who are hosting Darlene Shrugg’s gig Nov. 23 at eBar, put it in a recent Facebook post, “While [Darlene Shrugg] is made up of some of our favorite bands like U.S. Girls, Slim Twig, The Highest Order, Fake Palms, [and] Ice Cream, Darlene pack a punch all their own that needs to be seen, heard, and felt.”
Drummer Simone Tisshaw-Baril, a.k.a. Simone TB, sits behind the kit for a score of noteworthy groups. She’s also no slouch when it comes to running shows, notably helping plan the six-show closing run of iconic Toronto venue The Silver Dollar back in April. We spoke to TB ahead of Darlene Shrugg’s Guelph appearance about the state of the Toronto music scene.
Will Wellington: In a lot of the tracks on the new Darlene Shrugg record, you’ll take a classic rock beat and give it a weird twist, and then there are other tunes where you just really dig into a huge groove. I’m wondering how you approach making a beat for any particular song.
Simone TB: It’s not that thought out. I’m literally reacting to the other music that’s going on. [The beat] is usually not what comes first. Usually the songs start out with Max [Turnbull] and I workshopping stuff before bringing it to the rest of the group. Generally, my drumming and my parts are a direct reaction to what he’s doing melodically and rhythmically. Obviously, when you’re a drummer, you’re ingrained with certain [things] — you know where the two is, you know where the four is. But fortunately, and particularly with the collaboration, I’ve always been able to really play along as opposed to sitting with the backbeats.
WW: Do you think of your drumming as being melodic?
STB: I mean, yes, while recognizing that it isn’t. For whatever reason, that’s always how I’ve approached playing, and particularly with Max.
WW: How long have you been playing with Max?
STB: Since we were like 12 or 13, and we’re 29 now, so quite a while.
WW: Holy moly. So this isn’t your first project together.
STB: No, no. We played in a band called Tropics together for about 10 years. And before that we played in a pretty awful nu-metal band called Ctrl-Alt-Delete when we were [in] seventh, eighth grade.
WW: Oh my God, was it nu-metal as in rap metal?
STB: There was no rapping — we were at least, like, that self-aware. But it was super angsty and by all means terrible, but absolutely perfect at the time.
WW: On some of the songs on Darlene Shrugg, there’s a real free-flowing movement between the beat and the fills. I saw some documentary about the band Deerhoof, which talked about how, in Greg Saunier’s drumming, the fill is the beat. You played with Deerhoof a couple years ago in Guelph. I was wondering whether you and Greg from Deerhoof hung out at all backstage, talked drum tech.
STB: Yeah, yeah, we chatted drums. It’s hard not to in those situations. And you’re like, “Oh, you’re a player who plays with a certain ear as well.” Mutual admiration was going on. He’s pretty incredible to watch. I don’t know if you were at that show, but he’s definitely a total wonder.
Do you know somebody named Kid Millions? He does a thing called Man Forever, which actually just played in Guelph, and then Oneida is his main project. He’s similar. Just the incredible flow the two of them have. They almost look like they’re moving through water when they play drums. It’s very cool.
WW: When drummers hang out and chat, is there a classic first question or line? Like, I know for guitarists there’s always the joke, like “What pedals you got there?”
STB: I work at a music shop called Paul’s Boutique in Toronto, and older dudes, when they find out I’m a drummer, they’ll be like, “Oh, what about this kit? What about this kit?”
I’ve never been a gearhead. The only gear I’ve ever gotten into has been not drum gear — stuff for the studio — or I got a really nice cymbal once. But I didn’t have a drum kit for so long when I was first playing. Gear’s just never really mattered. It’s cheesy, but I’ve always had the attitude that — and maybe it’s why I play the way that I play — it’s not what you have, it’s how you play it. You [can] do something new on even the worst possible thing that you’ve been given.
That’s the nice thing about drums. If you have something to beat against something, you’re able to do it.
WW: So did you learn the Dave Grohl way, just drumming on pillows around the house?
STB: Yeah! Yeah, and because it’s not a melodic instrument, you really can. Listening to music is an incredible education if you’re focussing. You really can learn a lot about playing by just listening and playing along in your head.
WW: I’ve sure you’ve played Guelph a bunch of times with your different bands. Do you have a favourite Guelph memory? Or what stands out to you about playing in Guelph?
STB: I love Guelph. I have a number of really great friends there who are there doing awesome stuff and making art, like Justin Gordon. Probably my most precious memory would be the first time I played Guelph. Max and I were in a band called Tropics at the time and we were doing a handful of shows with the Constantines. This was their anniversary tour, and obviously everywhere they went there was a really amazing atmosphere. Doug MacGregor is an incredible drummer to watch every night. And it was really cool playing with them in Guelph, because that’s their hometown. The energy was amazing. That tour overall is just a very, very warm memory for me. But that Kazoo! we played with Deerhoof was really fun as well. Guelph is fabulous.
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WW: I was reading an article about The Silver Dollar closing and it was interesting to me how much of a pillar Dan Burke was in the community. How does the Toronto music scene work? Who are the pillars of that community now?
STB: As for any city, it’s ever-flowing. There’s always been a shift. Right now, it feels like a strange time. I feel like there are a couple different [old] guards still around. Some older people, some younger people coming in. I’m getting older myself, so I’m less in touch with some of the younger bands coming up.
It’s been really hard with a lot of venues closing. That’s one of the things that was highlighted with the Dollar. That was one of the clubs where Dan [Burke], as a booker, really booked in a traditional sense that most people don’t anymore — like, [he] booked with his ear, with his gut feeling, for bands he thought were exciting, thought were interesting, thought deserved a chance, in particular younger bands. There are certain promoters that go out of their way to do interesting, underrepresented stuff, like Burn Down the Capital.
But to be perfectly honest, it’s mostly bands that are putting on the events that matter and are encouraging their contemporaries to work with them. Teenanger are really good with that, putting on their own shows. In The Highest Order we love throwing our own shows. Basically we’d only really work in collaboration with Dan.
But — and this is the same thing when you tour around North America — the role of the promoter has been allowed to shift itself. There’s nothing really in the promotion. They’re not, generally, promoting. I don’t mean to make a sweeping statement, but generally you don’t see posters anymore. It’s almost surprising and encouraging when you go to a place and you see that somebody’s postered. We poster for our own shows, the bands that I’m in, but promoters don’t poster anymore. They expect you, even if you’re not from the town, to use Facebook and be the promoters, and will message you if you’re not posting enough on your social media. The music industry is in a really sad state right now for a lot of reasons in terms of live music.
WW: This is a question that an interviewer asked Dan Burke in January, and it kind of flows really well out of what you were just saying. Are there any good trends in music right now?
STB: There’s a trend of bands sticking up for themselves, not necessarily falling into the trap of management, booking agent, stuff like that — which means it’s a million times harder, but you’re not playing into the hands of what you’ve been told you have to do. You’ve got to be really, really special to be a manager that I trust personally. Or to be in that side of the music industry. People are taking it back a little bit themselves business-wise, which I think is encouraging and interesting.
WW: There was an interview that you did with the rest of The Highest Order. You were talking about fake punks, and you said, “instead of doing your hair, read a book or something.”
STB: (Laughter.) Yeah.
WW: What books are most influential for you?
STB: I’m going to go with [a book] that everybody should read if they’re into rock and roll and any kind of punk history and political history: Please Kill Me. It’s a collaboration between Legs McNeil and Gillian McCain. It’s an oral history of the beginning of the New York [scene] and punk in general. It also touches on what was going on in Ann Arbor and Michigan at the time with The Stooges and The White Panthers and The Black Panthers and politics in music. It’s incredible. Like I said, it’s an oral history, so it’s written by everybody who was there. The musicians, the visual artists, the political activists.
Also in that vein, there is a book called Unsettling Canada by Arthur Manuel, which is extremely important politically. I just read Soul On Ice, which is Eldridge Cleaver, who was the minister of information for The Black Panthers. But there are so many resources out there, and a library card’s free.
WW: When I was growing up, I was listening to The Mars Volta a lot, and I would always describe there being certain moments in a Mars Volta song where something absolutely crazy happens and you just have to yell, “Fuck yes!” Do you have a favourite “Fuck yes!” moment on the new Darlene Shrugg record?
STB: Ooh. (Laughter.) You know what? Can I say “the whole thing?” The whole thing’s awesome. The way we wrote it is so it’s fun to play all the time, and challenging to play every time, and challenging to listen to every time. There’s so much going on. And every time I do listen to it or play live, I hear things that the rest of the band are doing and I’m just like, “Wow!” To me, it’s a group of really amazing players whom I love playing with, but I also love learning from. It’s just constantly exciting for me.
Darlene Shrugg play the eBar on Thursday, Nov. 23.
Their new self-titled record is out now via Upset! The Rhythm.
[Correction: The print version and previous web version of this article mistakenly listed the title of Darlene Shrugg’s record as Strawberry Milk.]Photo courtesy of Colin Medley