The Pavement frontman’s new album is inspired by Berlin nightlife and YouTube tutorials. Is he having a mid-life crisis?
At Coava Coffee Roasters, a hip cafe in a gentrifying neighbourhood in Portland, shelves are made from disused machinery, the handmade bamboo tables are eco-friendly, and the single-origin coffee is served in glass Chemex carafes. Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen couldn’t dream up a more stereotypically Portland scene – except for the music on the stereo, which shuffles between brash electropop and dubstep. It’s a strangely fitting place to meet Stephen Malkmus. As the former frontman of 1990s slacker titans Pavement, he’s an icon of indie rock at its scruffiest, yet his new solo album, Groove Denied, is electronic music partly inspired by a stint living in Berlin.
“I’m not known for being groovy,” admits Malkmus, a 52-year-old father of two who looks every bit the middle-aged rocker dad: salt-and-pepper mop top, white shirt, tatty white trainers. “The first song is supposed to sound like you went out clubbing in Berlin and came back and tried to make a song when you were off your head. Or an aural version of one of those pictures of [techno DJ] Ricardo Villalobos where he’s completely trashed.”
Related: Stephen Malkmus: Groove Denied review – stark, forbidding soundscapes
Continue reading...by Philip Sherburne via Electronic music | The Guardian
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