http://rockandrollghost.blogspot.com/2009/03/interview-mikael-jorgensen-all-is.html
If you know much about the rock band Wilco by now you know that everyone involved works on projects outside of the group. Whether it be John Stirratt and Pat Sansone’s The Autumn Defense, or Nels Cline and Glenn Kotche’s assorted work or even those projects of band leader Jeff Tweedy.
But until now keyboardist Mikael (pronounced Michael) Jorgensen had been primarily known for his engineering work outside of Wilco. All that’s changed with the release of All Is Golden by Mikael’s band Pronto.
Released earlier this month on Contraphonic Records, All Is Golden is a straight-forward set of songs that fall into some sort of netherworld where good music in the tradition of the singer-songwriter style lives. It’s not current Top 40 nor is it necessarily stuck in the 70s-era that many in the press are tagging it as. What I like most about Pronto’s debut is that it’s earnest and honest. Jorgensen isn’t putting on airs and he’s not forcing an arch or discomforting style down the listener’s throat. I appreciate the ease in which the songs come across, even while knowing that any art that sounds easy is never so.
With his core band in place (Jorgensen is on lead vocals, keyboards and guitars, Greg O’Keeffe – who has been playing with Jorgensen for upwards of 13 years – is on drums, Erik Paparazzi – who has played with Cat Power and was in the band Lizard Music with Jorgensen in the 90s – is on guitar and Tunde Oyewole – who played with Jonathan Fire Eater’s Stewart Upton in the band The Childballads – is on bass), Jorgensen is now at the tail end of a quick promo tour for the debut album. They play tonight at Calvin Theatre in Northampton, MA and tomorrow night in Chicago at Martyr’s for a CD release show. I am lucky enough to be able to go to the Chicago show, but if you like the band and still want to see them live Jorgensen promises more touring this fall once Wilco’s tour plans have subsided.
Below is an edited conversation I had with Jorgensen two weeks back when he was a bit under the weather and trying to stay one step ahead of the myriad of issues he now has to deal with as a band leader. Go out and purchase Pronto’s All Is Golden, whether it be via paid download or at your local record store. And check out the band’s MySpace page for more information.
Rock & Roll Ghost: Is the Wilco schedule pretty much laid out so it’s easier to see what holes there are for Pronto to tour?
Mikael Jorgensen: For the most part. I know more or less what I’m going to be doing and where I’ll be through the end of September. This is my first time doing this. I just have to try and orchestrate those off times and keep the other guys in Pronto interested and excited without going ‘Alright guys, I’ll see you in six months! Take care. Don’t stop practicing!’ That’s going to be one of the challenges…I don’t think it’s going to be bad. We’re just going to have to figure it out when it comes.
With the gestations that Pronto has gone through – with members coming and going since its inception – would you rather prefer things remain loose or would you rather the band be a solid unit?
I would love for it to be a solid unit for a bunch of reasons. But that doesn’t mean it can’t move into something else. There’s something about the stability or the threat of stability that’s appealing at this point because it’s been so by hook or by crook for so long. In a way it’s about managing expectations for us and for our potential future fame.
What was the period of time that made up the recording of the album? It took years?
Yeah. I played my first solo show at the Hideout in Chicago in November 2005. I had been going through this time of personal upheaval. I had lost both my folks in under a year in 2004. A breakup with a girlfriend. All these things contributed to a not cool vibe. And then I just decided that I gotta do something to get my head straight and work on something positive and constructive. Let me play a solo show, let me see how that goes. That didn’t go awfully. Let me make a record, let’s see where that goes. We started recording in January 2006. We did maybe three sessions in total – January, March and April. It was at that time that I tried to pick up the momentum of taking charge of my own thing. Like I gotta move back closer to my family and my sister and my east coast roots. I moved back to Brooklyn to escape those really brutal Chicago winters. Not that New York is a tropical paradise comparatively. It’s all small differences.
I feel you on that. I barely made it through this past winter in Chicago.
Moving to New York I knew I would need to be in Chicago often for Wilco. So it wasn’t abandoning anything because I’d come back…I was just there for a month in February and then a month in October for recording and then for the residency last year. I’m always coming back. And then Sky Blue Sky happened as soon as I moved back to Brooklyn. And then I toured and I didn’t have the time to get to it. And also I was trying to put together a New York version of the band and concentrating on getting some live version of it together. That worked out fairly well and I made some friends, too. Then it was the standard New York dilemma where most musicians have four or five other things going on and scheduling becomes the biggest challenge. As soon as the Sky Blue Sky touring was finished in the fall of 2007. I mixed the record in Chicago at Soma, mastered it at the Chicago Mastering Services in January (2008).
And then I started this long process of trying to find a label. Through all the people I knew, especially from working at Soma and with Wilco. The most frustrating aspect of it all was the lack of response. I was in Chicago last fall and was talking to a good friend of mine. I was like ‘Man, I’m having a really hard time finding anyone to give me the time of day.’ I know the economy’s weird and the music industry’s in flux but c’mon, people still buy records and use iTunes. My friend Toby introduced me to Ben Schulman from Contraphonic and we started talking just around Halloween. It happened really quickly and without any hitches. I had CDs by Christmas and now it’s released. It’s turning into something real. Until this week it was like, ‘Oh I got a box of 300 of these in my living room.’ It’s actually taking on its own energy which is really exciting.
Is being in Wilco a help or a hindrance when you’re coming out with your own work?
It’s both to a certain degree. Clearly there’s an advantage to being able to say, ‘The guy from Wilco’s releasing a solo record or project’. It’s got a certain currency with writers and radio stations, it gives them a reason to consider it a little bit longer. The negative parts or the sort of difficulties…I can see it being a situation where people would maybe not listen to the music so much and base their opinions about it on a perception of Wilco and a perception of Jeff and a perception of ‘the laptop guy’. I guess that’s one of the things I’ve been keeping aware of. But it hasn’t happened. And the press so far has been really digging it and accurate [in their] descriptions. The 70s thing has been pushed a little too hard, but…it really is amazing that you say one thing or somebody writes one thing and then all of a sudden…
Did you feel any kind of reluctance to move back to Brooklyn and was their any worry caused about doing so?
It was kind of a risky move. I’ve always wanted to live in New York and here’s an opportunity. I stressed about it horrendously. To the point where I threw my back out the day I signed my lease. [I was] plagued with awful doubt. Sometimes it’s a little frustrating mostly because we don’t all have the same kind of access we used to have. But the band dynamic has, I think, changed for the better over the past couple of records where the writing sessions are explicitly scheduled. So everybody makes time. There were sessions before that were maybe a little less structured. It’s only an hour and a half, two hour flight to Chicago. If I had to get to Chicago tonight, it’d be expensive, but it could happen. The equipment thing is kind of a weird problem. Like I have my Wilco gear and that stays in Chicago and I have my Pronto equipment in New York. [With] some of it there’s a little bit of crossover. Having to check lots of bags on flights sometimes gets challenging.
And expensive I can imagine.
Well Wilco’s been faithful to an airline so we all have frequent flyer miles and travel benefits. So I get three bags free.
Bonus.
Yeah, total bonus. And frequent flyer miles so we get to take vacations and that kind of thing. It’s like standard business travel.
The whole Wilco organization is a myriad of interesting deals and special bonuses.
I was talking to Glenn once, ‘It’s funny I always see this Tiger Woods guy…I’m so sick and tired of seeing that guy everywhere.’ And then it dawned on me that the reason I see him is because he’s a business traveler advertisement. You are a business traveler. Oh right. I guess that’s true.
You mentioned something about having access. Was that access to Jeff or what did you mean by that?
Yeah, access to Jeff, access to the Loft. There was a general invitation to anybody who wanted to come and play music. That didn’t always happen, but an open invitation. I think that the reason that’s changed significantly is because everybody’s become quite busy with their family lives. It’s not so easy to duck out at 9 o’clock and get to the Loft for 2-3 hours and work on something when there’s children. I think it’s going to restructure some things for us but won’t seem too much different for fans.
So there haven’t been any issues with regards to moving with the band?
No. Our manager Tony is here as well. I figured that of all the places I could move it wasn’t like I was moving to Spokane. I have access to Tony and if I have to take care of anything I can go to the office right here in midtown.
With regards to Pronto, are the lyrics all you?
Yeah. That was definitely my first real crack at trying to write some lyrics that were genuine. I’d been playing instrumental music for so long and I’d always loved instrumental music and I kind of gravitated towards that. I thought that it was nice to get out of the safety zone of that. I imagine that I’ll look back on it as ‘Oh that was cute. I can’t believe you really wrote lyrics like that.’
Do you find yourself writing more since then?
It’s funny because I’ll write here or on tour or on a plane. Sometimes I’ll get ideas or it’s just writing down a bunch of observations or strange personal interactions I witnessed. When we play at the space, we set up all the recording equipment and just record and forget it’s running and just begin playing and improvising. And then something will take form and then we’ll learn how to play it and then I’ll put my notebook up on the music stand and start flipping through pages. And whatever’s on the page I’ll start singing over what we’re playing. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.
How hard is it to change up from being on tour with Wilco and then going on tour with Pronto?
It is kind of a comedown or whatever. I have such a different level of investment with Pronto. Up until this point I’ve called the shots and it’s been my thing. I’ve been deeply involved in that in every aspect that I could be involved with. I’m welcoming all this work because with Wilco it’s completely taken care of by our management and our agents and our accountants and our roadies and all the people that work for the band. I’m always perpetually grateful. I may not say thank you every day, but I’m always grateful to the work that everybody does. For me this is a learning experience that goes beyond just the music making process. I’ve been having a great time being colossally busy taking care of this and having to make decisions and living and dying by them. It’s not a Herculean effort to get a proper show underway. As long as we continue to have fun and enjoy…because I think everyone loves to travel and play music. At this point it pays for itself and there’s a little bit of money after the fact. I’d like for it to get a little bit bigger and have it be something that people look forward to.
