the Rocket, October 1991

The Walkabouts

by David A. Kulczyk

(from Issue #43 of Pop Culture Press. For information on how to get issues of PCP, click here.)

The Walkabouts were together when Tad was butchering cows in Idaho, Eddie Vedder was skipping high school in San Diego, and Sub Pop was just an idea Jonathan Poneman talked about to bands between sets. Playing together wherever they could and releasing records on whatever labels showed interest, The Walkabouts unceasingly plugged away. "We were persistent to the point of stupidity," said songwriter, singer and guitarist Chris Eckman.

Their persistence paid off in 1990, when they embarked on their first European tour, which led to very favorable reviews, more tours, and records on Sub Pop Europe, Glitterhouse, and, eventually, Virgin Records. For five years now, they've been a big draw in Europe, releasing 13 CDs (including three solo Chris and Carla records and one live Walkabouts CD), performing at 2,000-plus seat halls and selling over 200,000 copies of their records (1996's 'Devil's Road' sold over 90,000 copies alone).

Despite having such distinguished musical luminaries as Brian Eno, Natalie Merchant, Ivan Kral and Peter Buck contributing to their records, The Walkabouts are essentially unknown in the country in which their passports are issued. Perhaps it's because they've released a steady stream of quality non-commercial material that is never going to be the flavor of the month. Or maybe it's because of the bad feelings a certain Seattle record company caused while negotiating their deal with the major U.S. labels. Then again, it could be that The Walkabouts' music is too close to the isolation and destitution of the American dream for the stateside public to swallow.

I interviewed the fearless leaders of The Walkabouts, Chris Eckman and Carla Torgerson in their beautiful Seattle apartment on June 14th, a few days before they were set out on yet another European tour to back up their latest release, 'Nighttown.'

NIGHTTOWN

CARLA: Chris wrote a lot of songs. I think we had 22 songs for the album. We started seeing a theme that could hold the whole album together, so we worked harder on the ones that had to do with nighttime and urban settings.

CHRIS: It kind of ended up sort of by accident that I sat down to write songs and they had this shared thing to them. So we were like, maybe we should do the record like that. It wasn't at first like any deliberate thing. It came out of experimenting and just seeing where it was going. In some ways it's even quieter than the last record ('Devil's Road'). We were moving in a different direction, but there was still a touch of what we'd done before. It's probably the first record we've done since 'Satisfied Mind' that's really, really different, and that excites me! I think that some people will hear it and be confused, but if you listen to it a little bit, you'll start to get it. It's a very quiet record, but minimum and maximum at the same time. Because there's strings all over it, it has space, but then there's a lot of things happening on it.

ON STRINGS

CARLA: We wanted to do it one more time because we learned a lot doing 'Devil's Road' and working with (string arranger) Mark Nichols. We mostly handed it ('Devil's Road') over to him, but on 'Nighttown' we had a few more meetings with him before recording to see exactly what he was doing and try to integrate him and his parts more.

CHRIS: We wanted to make it seamless, like there weren't just strings in the band.

CARLA: On 'Devil's Road,' we recorded for two weeks in Germany and then went to Poland at the end of the session to lay the strings down. We had written the songs with them in mind, where they were going to be able to shine. But this time we recorded for two weeks out at Bear Creek Studio (outside Seattle) and at the end of those two weeks we had the strings come in and lay down their parts. Then we added singing, acoustic guitars and synthesizer so we could respond to the strings. I think they even got more integrated.

CHRIS: It's interesting on this record because there's more songs with strings, but in some ways there's less strings than 'Devil's Road.' I know that doesn't make much sense, but they're kind of used very sparingly.

VIRGIN RECORDS

CHRIS: We certainly sold more records, but we haven't made more money from selling more records because we spend a lot more on making them. We got a lot more money up front, so we can look down the line and say over the next nine months we have a wage. Whereas for years that was pretty hard to say. It certainly changes the way that we promote records. I just spent five weeks doing promotion. It was unbelievable!

CARLA: At Sub Pop we had a lot of people that were depending on us doing well because we were their biggest sellers in Europe. So we had a lot of pressure. We lost that pressure now because the Rolling Stones, Janet Jackson, and the Spice Girls pay for everything.

CHRIS: I'm all for the Spice Girls! I want them to sell more and more records because (Virgin Records) are going to leave us more and more alone as long as their bank balance is doing great. We're a credible band, we get great press and we look okay, but we're not making much money for them. We're protected as long as the label is doing well, but if the label starts suffering, we're the first to go.

DEATH VALLEY DAYS (Lost Songs and Rarities)

CHRIS: We got asked to do it three years ago. but we were scared because we had to go back and listen to that stuff.

CARLA: And listen to oddball tapes and stuff people bootlegged.

CHRIS: It's sort of like looking at your baby photos. Now we can look at the past with a clear and more relaxed attitude towards it.

CARLA: We were kind of surprised that the very early days of The Walkabouts are very similar to 'Devil's Road.' We realized that we had strings and cello on this early stuff and we had forgotten about it. You can't remember everything after ten years.

CHRIS: We had a really rock phase with 'Setting The Woods On Fire.' We had stopped using those textures.

CARLA: So we were surprised that after all those years, there was a theme that kind of sounded like The Walkabouts.

SUB POP

CHRIS: Jonathan (Poneman) truly believed that somehow The Walkabouts and Mudhoney could be sold together as a package. This was part of Pavitt's version, too, that this is regional music.

CARLA: They thought that since they were into both bands, why can't everyone else?

CHRIS: We finished our 1990 tour at some big show in London, playing with Tad and Mudhoney. Jonathan was just gleeful. We were about to go on, and the whole band was like, "What if they throw things at us?" And Jonathan was like, "This is the greatest night of my life! I can't believe this! We're in London, two sold out nights and all of us are here!" And I'm like, "No, this isn't going to work." And we were right; it didn't work. Most people aren't going to be that open-minded. Because of his own musical taste. Reinhard, who ran Sub Pop Europe, had a totally different vision. He was like, (German accent) "This is a totally different band. We put grunge over here and The Walkabouts over there. We have to treat them differently. It's not going to be an instant hype sell, but there are people who will buy this." That made a huge difference.

CARLA: In America and being on Sub Pop, people held that against us and wouldn't give us the time of day. Because if they didn't like what they heard on Sub Pop, they'd never listen to us!

EUROPEAN SUCCESS

CHRIS: It's strange, we'll sell the most amount of records in Germany, but I wouldn't say we are more popular there. You have to look at certain per capita, where you fit into the industry in a particular country. I'd say we are bigger in places like Portugal, Belgium and Greece. Nighttime debuted at number four in Greece! First week out and bam! Number four! We probably sold more than fifteen or twenty thousand records there. The Greek market is so small.

CARLA: It was so funny with them because they took to The Walkabouts relatively early, and they were so proud that their country was into us before any other country.

CHRIS: Some people get a little suspicious, like in France. They're like, (French accent) "Why are you not bigger in the United States?" In Greece they are so happy that we're not big in America. They feel like we're theirs. I did a couple of Greek interviews yesterday, and every one ended with, (Greek accent) "So you have a very special relationship with the Greek people. What do you have to say to your Greek fans at this time?"

CARLA: Another strange thing about Greece is we get so many gifts there. People will give us little bottles filled with colored rocks, little baskets, jewelry, photographs.

CHRIS: It's a strange country in what does well there. Nick Cave has been a pop star there well before he was a pop star anywhere else. In America he's a cult figure, but in Europe he is truly a pop star. You turn on MTV Europe at ten in the morning and see a Nick Cave video. In the late 1980s, he was playing two thousand seat places in Greece when he was still playing clubs throughout Europe.

CARLA: Camper Van Beethoven always did well there and later on Cracker, The Tindersticks and REM did well there, too. There's very few select groups that they go nuts over, so it's a real honor.

A MOVE TO EUROPE?

CHRIS: We are away so much, and we see people increasingly less and less that it's really important to come back to a place where we have friends and family. Like last night, we went out to the Crocodile (Peter Buck's Seattle night club). I go out about once every six months, so it was great! If we lived in London and went out to a club, I wouldn't know a fucking soul! It cost us a lot of money, but I think it's worth the money.

TOWNES VAN ZANDT

CHRIS: Boy, what can you say? You don't often get to meet people that you've been influenced by. I had the chance to meet him half a dozen years ago and got to hang out with him a couple of years ago for a few days. Sadly, we never knew Townes when he was healthy. He was pretty much on the decline. He was a really incredibly sweet guy. It's impossible to estimate the influence he had on my songwriting. When I first heard his music in the late '80s, right around the time that we did the 'Cataract' album, everything changed for me. I realized that, wow, this is how it's done. It was a flash of recognition for me. In December we got this tape in the mail, and it was him doing this song from 'Devil's Road' called "The Stopping Off Place." It was a bit humbling, just to hear Townes singing these words that I wrote. The weird thing about it is that it somehow worked.

ON BEING A MUSICIAN

CHRIS: You have to look at it as a process, that's the most important thing. You do it because you love to do it. The process has to be important, not just the end result of it. If you're not enjoying the process then you really should be doing something else. If you just want end results, then go sell vacuum cleaners.

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(Many thanks to David A. Kulczyk and Pop Culture Press for letting us use this interview! David also writes Kulczyk's Korner and other material for Maximum Ink.)