Interview in Phawker.com

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BY JONATHAN VALANIA Mikael Jorgensen is the keyboard player for Wilco, who open for Neil Young Friday at the Spectrum (tix still available, yo). He’s the one in the Clark Kent glasses and untucked Oxford and Charlie Brown sweater combo, hunched over his MacBook and triggering disembodied sonic filigree and sine wave surrealism, like a mischievous child coloring outside the lines of Wilco’s horse-drawn Americana. Jorgensen — a Leonardo, New Jersey native who recently moved from Wilco’s HQ in Chicago to Brooklyn — first made Phawker’s acquaintance back in the mid-90s when he was a member of Lizard Music, and Phawker was a member of the Psyclone Rangers and both bands were on the World Domination label and going nowhere fast. Next thing you know — SHAZAM! — he’s playing keyboards in Wilco Version 2.0. In between, he has been nursing his obsession with early 70s AM radio pop with a revolving cast of collaborators (members of Iron & Wine, Cat Power, Califone and Antibalas) under the nom de rock Pronto, which just released the damn swell All Is Golden (Contraphonic).

PHAWKER: What, no mention of Lizard Music in your bio? It’s like it never happened. It’s like Stalin with Trotsky. It’s like the disappeared of Argentina! What’s up with that? That’s, like, a crime against humanity, especially what happened in Argentina.

MIKAEL JORGENSEN [pictured, right in red sweater]: OK, I cut my teeth on the mean New Jersey streets in a gleefully apoplectic pop band called Lizard Music during the early part of the Clinton administration.  At mid-winter all ages weekend matinee shows (in seaside bars that saw brisk business in the summer months), our Beatles cum XTC cum Captain Beefheart band was surrounded by scores of bands using sludgy guitars, tuneless yelling and shoe-in-the-dryer style drumming. We made a record.  It made a little noise.  If you’re lucky & dogged, you can still find them in places that also sell bric-a-brac. I left Lizard Music to form Movere Workshop in ‘96.  This is where Greg O’Keeffe enters the picture, and we’ve been pals ever since, see?

PHAWKER: Listen, if they take you to the Hague, the best defense is to do like that dude from Serbia and stall for years on end until you die in jail. Genius, really. So what prompted the move to Brooklyn? (And by all means, enjoy it while you can. Not to keep harping on it, but this ‘crimes against humanity’ thing is pretty serious business.)

MIKAEL JORGENSEN: It’s like living on Sesame Street, complete with an actual, honest-to-god grouch that lives in the basement and hangs out by the trash.  Instead of having a pet worm, this grouch has two disgusting pit-bulls and they share a studio garden apartment next to the boiler room while he complains relentlessly into a blue-tooth earpiece while sucking down Heinekins. Pronto mainstay and co-conspirator Greg O’Keeffe and I have a rehearsal/recording space in his favorite part of town, SLUMBO (or RAMBO depending on who you ask), where we toil on new Pronto material.  I swear to god there are gypsies living in a mini-van with a camper trailer on the street outside our space.  I hope to see their documentary on Current TV someday.What’s not to love?

PHAWKER: What is a typical day in the life of a guy in Wilco who lives in Brooklyn? Do you just ‘text it in,’ as the kids say? (In my day, we ‘faxed it in,’ but that’s another story.)

MIKAEL JORGENSEN: I spend a lot of time arguing with cabbies who always make a face when I tell them I’m going to Brooklyn from either the airport or late night East Village escapades.  Then I rise, cook up some espresso based drinks – a “cup-of-chino” if you will, dice potatoes & whatever vegetables are laying around and make a frittata.  Deal with email for a spell and then head down to our studio and work on Pronto music with Greg.  Pick up the laundry and head home for dinner with my wife, friends and, when he’s around, Stephen Colbert.

PHAWKER: Do you ever get the feeling that Tweedy is sweating Pronto? Like he’s scheduling more Wilco shows just to keep you from Pronto?

MIKAEL JORGENSEN: No one knows this, but I actually wrote all of “A.M.” and Jeff has been stealing my songs ever since.  I had to start a new band to put him off the trail, so thanks for blowing my cover.  He’s totally gonna read this and now we’re done for.

PHAWKER: If Pronto had an arm wrestling contest with Autumn Defense, who would win? What about a wheel barrow race? Or would it all just devolve into an argument about the proper way to wear a scarf? In which case, who is right? I mean, people need to know that shit.

MIKAEL JORGENSEN: We would tie, but they would get a 1/4 point extra for style.  The competition heats portion would be an exciting montage of Pronto beating the snot out of Gary Coleman, Gary Cole, Cole Porter, Porter Wagoner, Natalie Portman, Natalie Merchant, Stephen Merchant, Chan Marshall and Marshall Mathers.

PHAWKER: Do the other guys in Wilco ever complain that you get to sit down and play your laptop while they have to stand for the whole concert?

MIKAEL JORGENSEN: After every show, the guys are all, “I’m so tired from standing and playing my vintage instrument – made long before touch-tone technology with care and love by humans.  Hey Mike, when are you gonna give us *our* chance to take it easy and Type-Along-With-Wilco?!” I grow ever so weary of these incessant laments.

PHAWKER: Do you ever check your email or surf for porn during a Wilco concert? C’mon, be honest!

MIKAEL JORGENSEN: I’m liveblogging every possible second of the show and the data gets submitted to a computer program that graphically interprets my posts and returns images like this:

PHAWKER: Yikes. That’s what Kings Of Leon is gonna look like if they don’t start taking care of themselves. Pronto reminds me of a band from the future that discovers 70s AM radio in a time capsule, and they like the way it makes them feel, and even though they can’t really relate to the words on the surface, they always feel better when they sing along. I mean that as a compliment.

MIKAEL JORGENSEN: Accurate. I grew up in a classic-rock-free household.  A chance hearing of “Another Brick In The Wall” on someone else’s car radio was as close as I got to that world.  I am a complete tourist to the mythical 70s AM radio stations.  As a kid, I was listening to the records my Dad, who was a recording engineer, brought home after work.  Most notably, he worked extensively with Bob James and recorded the theme to the TV show TAXI, the basketball theme on the soundtrack to the 1984 Olympic games (totally true) and many other records that have percolated through pop culture, mainly as samples utilized by hip-hop groups.

PHAWKER: “Good Friends Gone” is a real gem. That is not a question, it is a statement of fact.

MIKAEL JORGENSEN: Many thanks.  We’re quite proud of her – she’s going on two and a half, almost three now.

PHAWKER: True or false: The new Randy Newman album is fucking excellent!

MIKAEL JORGENSEN: Firstly, I take offense to this Gotcha!-style journalism! Secondly, true. Thirdly, Randy is an obvious hero, and while listening to the record, see if you can figure out which of the songs is the secret Randy Newman tribute!  In fact, you’ll need to buy two copies of the record and play them both at the same time, flip one out of phase, and thanks to Newton’s (1)  Law of Common Mode Rejection, you’ll be able to hear super-secret messages!  So be sure to camp out all night on March 9th, 2009 in front of your favorite, finer record store with enough cash to buy yourself a pair.  Then prepare for utter rapture and bragging rights that should last well past the anniversary of the discovery of Uranus (March 13th, 1781).

(1)  Not to be confused with Sir Isaac Newton.  Commonly attributed to Myron Thaddeus Newton (2), Lafayette, IN, [1912-1975]

(2) Doesn’t actually exist.  Don’t bother the Newton heirs, they’re innocent pawns in this sad game.