Leave the Sad Things Behind
Paula Frazer stays true to her muse

interview by Will Seeley

photo by Olga K.

After gaining international attention with her band Tarnation, SF's Paul Frazer went indie again, but didn't necessarily scale back. Tarnation emerged in the early days of alt-country, but Frazer's vision owed as much to Ennio Morricone and sixties pop as it did to Hank Williams or Patsy Cline. With her solo album Indoor Universe, she took the same sounds and made them more baroque, and now on Leave the Sad Things Behind, she follows the thread, coming out with an extraordinary album graced with the talents of members of the Court and Spark, the Moore Brothers, SF avant-cellist Joan Jeanrenaud and many others.

Will Seeley: You just had a CD release party. What makes that different from a normal show?

Paula Frazer: Well, you have a huge guest list! There were so many people that helped with the record, all kinds of people. It was fun!

WS: How come it took so long to come out with another record?

PF: We actually finished this record last August, ‘04, but it took a long time to set it up and you want to be able to put it out when the label has time to promote it. They had a lot of things already scheduled for last spring, so we had to wait till the fall.

WS: How did you hook up with this label?

PF: Birdman? Dave Katznelson was the person who got 4AD and Reprise interested in me, he was working at Reprise in ' 92-'93, so we've worked together since then. Birdman is his label, even when he was working at Reprise he still had his own label.

WS: How do you like being indie compared to being on a major label like Reprise?

PF: It's pretty different, you know. They had more money! But that didn't necessarily mean anything. It was kind of like having rich parents who are always too busy for you, you know? I never knew who would be there when I would call, because people would be getting laid off with no notice. I have a lot of amazing equipment and stuff that I was able to buy because of Reprise. But they didn't really send me out on tour that much or anything. It was nice to be able to pay the musicians that play with me.

WS: Tell me about recording this album. You were up in Cotati?

PF: Yeah, I've recorded up there a few times, when I was using the name Tarnation…

WS: Why did you stop using Tarnation?

PF: I might use it again for the next record. I'm considering it. It doesn't seem to matter if I use my name or Tarnation at this point. It would be kind of funny to mix it up a little. My next record is going to be pretty lo-fi.

WS: Is there a distinction in your head between Tarnation music and Paula Frazer music?

PF: Not really. Tarnation was always the same thing that I do now. Me and whoever was available. I had something like seven drummers under the name Tarnation. Two of them are still here, but the rest of them moved away. One guy joined Blue Man Group in Las Vegas!

WS: Patrick Main has been with you for a while though right?

PF: Yeah, he's been with me for seven years, but he can never really tour, because he has a salary job.

WS: How does songwriting work for you? Is it a song a day, or is it more slow going?

PF: It can be pretty slow going. I like to go with the flow and see what happens. If I'm inspired to do it and have the time to do it. Usually I write with the guitar.

WS: What comes first, the melody or the words?

PF: The melody usually. There's only a few songs that I've written the words first.

WS: What is touring like for you? Do you sleep on people's floors?

PF: Pretty much! We rented a family van and went on tour and got the cheapest hotels when we couldn't find someone's floor. It was pretty rough, playing to like five or ten people if we're lucky. One show we played, there was nobody there to see us.

WS: Do you like touring?

PF: I like the road trip part of it. I like hanging out with the people I'm playing music with, and visiting friends. And we play good shows, but it's sort of like having a rehearsal, when there's only two people to see us. When we played in Eugene, there was nobody to see us!

WS: Does it ever make you feel depressed, like you should go get that salary job?

PF: No, but it does make me feel like I should spend more time recording, that that's the worthwhile thing. Touring is very hard, and it's very expensive as well, as you can imagine. So here we are, we played at Heavy Metal Happy Hour in San Diego! And I have a weaving business, so I'm losing money, especially because this is the busy time of year. I should be at home recording, I have all these songs for the next record.