Mike Wookey Interview/Profile
9/18/02
I was in a online chat with Kimya Dawson when she introduced me to some of her online friends, one of them was Mike Wookey. He told me of his music site, and asked if I would interview him, which I agreed to.
Mike's music is quite accomplished for someone starting out, and his lyrics have a simplicity about them that is quite refreshing when people tend to overwrite when they are starting out. He is playing in local clubs, and is getting more and more popular. He is studying music at college, and intends on giving it a try as a full-time profession.
Krisbee: Okay, lets start with the
basics; how old, sex, location?
Mike Wookey: 19/m/uk... I live in the place where the Titanic came from.
Krisbee: How long have you been recording music?
Mike Wookey: Three years
Krisbee: What do you record to?
Mike Wookey: Oh, I use a Roland 8 track thingy. I got it massively cheap, reduced from 900 to 180 pounds without a guarantee. Then it broke and cost loads to fix, so I couldn't do anything 'til I saved up.
Krisbee: All Gone is a great song; really fleshed out. How did that one come about, because it is deceptively simple, but there is quite a bit of orchestration on it...
Mike Wookey: I recorded it in several different places. It started in my friends uni room. I went there to pick something up and was gonna meet him at home, but stayed instead and recorded the main part of that first section using his keyboards and PC. All that noise on the first section is just guitars and things slowed down, because it was just going to be a guitar song. Then I recorded the piano at another friends house; that was basically improvised. The rest was done in my shed, apart from the strings through the rest of the song which I recorded those at a later date in the same uni room while my friend was asleep. The saxophone solo was done by my friend Andy. He just made it up on the spot, which I was impressed with. Er.. I think my friend Pete also did some bits and pieces on it, too, like sampled the piano and messed it about.
Krisbee: Do a lot of your songs have collaborators?
Mike Wookey: No, just the new stuff. I'm intending to make an album where each song has a different friend. I've only recently learned how to work with other people.
Krisbee: What changed?
Mike Wookey: I have a friend, Sharif, who is kind of my guru. He's always on at me about learning to work creatively with others, so I am trying my best. I still find it hard to let others do the creative stuff, but I like if they do bits and pieces to help me out. I guess I've realized it's not always best to do things alone.
Krisbee: How do you go about writing your songs, do you leave blocks for the other people to fill in, or is it fleshed out enough for you, and they embellish?
Mike Wookey: I write them alone. They just embellish... the techniques vary. I write most stuff on piano or guitar. The best stuff is on piano, I've been told.
Krisbee: You seem to have a good production strength, without going too far. It's a very delicate thing, especially because your best songs have a delicateness to them. You also seem to repeat ideas over and over in a song, whether it is in the lyrics, which are simple, or the looping piano lines; musically towards the end of the songs, they alter just a bit, which makes it very interesting.
Krisbee: You have 4 or 5 songs very similar in tone, which I like a lot, and then you have a few songs that run the gamut in style; just having fun?
Mike Wookey: No... the style doesn't matter. I have to admit that sometimes the music is taking the piss, but the words are always serious. It gives a nice contrast anyway, within a song. All Round Town does that. The lyrics are supposed to be quite mean in places, but the music is disco. The idea is that you don't know how to react.
Krisbee: I know I didn't.. my final reaction was I didn't care for it.. unlike Too Young, which is carefree in tone, but not lyrically; it has a Magnetic Fields quality to it. It was more effective there with the contrasts.
Krisbee: Making Sense has the gothic tone to it, but it also has electronica or even new age in it, which is again where the contrasts work. Speedfreak is nice, but what is the story behind it?
Mike Wookey: It's not very hidden. I was sitting on a bench in a park with a girl with red hair and I liked her. We were chatting and then some kids on speed came up and asked me for money and when I said no they spat in my hair. I knew they were on speed because they tried to sell it to me before, you can just tell. The sympathy lyric is sarcastic though; I fell out with the girl it's about before I wrote the song and she turned out to be massively horrible. It's a kind of nice way of saying "I know you look down on me."
Krisbee: Are all the songs personal, do they always refer to something?
Mike Wookey: Pretty much, although I don't always know it straight away.
Krisbee: Like a dream?
Mike Wookey: Well sometimes I ramble the lyrics and then work them out later. Kind of like a dream yeah, just got what you meant.
Mike is at the cusp of his career; he has found his voice, and his technical skills are solidifying. He has to decide now what is important to him, and what are his options to make music a full-time career.
Krisbee: Do you think you are going to make it in music?
Mike Wookey: Oh, good question. I really want to, of course, but I am aware that I'm going to have to change if I want to, and I don't like the idea of compromise. I'm a stubborn fool.
Krisbee: What would you have to change?
Mike Wookey: I suppose I'd have to ditch the art and bring on the commercial, and if that is the case, then no, I won't make it.
Krisbee: What's more important, staying true to artistic vision, or having more people enjoy your art?
Mike Wookey: Staying true.
Krisbee:
I think it depends when art is your commerce, and you are selling it... if you
enjoy drawing pictures of dog shit, no matter how well you might draw, it will have a
limited appeal.
Krisbee: For example, The Velvet Underground had a much rawer sound when John Cale was a part of the group, and when he left, the group had a more refined sound, perhaps it was more palatable, but I am not sure that they sold out.
Mike Wookey: That's true. They definitely didn't sell out.
Krisbee: They didn't sell at all!!
Mike Wookey: Touché... They do now, though.
Krisbee: Ah-ha!
Mike Wookey: I like all their albums for different reasons. The first one is raw as hell. I like the care-freeness, and I can imagine Andy Warhol being there. The second album, kind of the same reason; it's even more care-free than the first.. The third because the song writing is so good; it's a total surprise. The fourth because it proves good pop exists.
Krisbee: What then inspires you to keep going?
Mike Wookey: This is gonna sound pretentious: I think that I need music to keep my head sorted. So even if I know I won't get a record deal I'll still do it. It is the way I express myself. Sounds pretentious. And cliche. Nevermind.
Right now, Mike has his music posted on the internet, and I wanted to ask him what that has brought him, what are his thoughts on having his music readily available internationally.
Krisbee: In regards to your website, have you had much luck in attracting people?
Mike Wookey: Surprisingly yes, way more hits than I thought I'd get, with minimum promotion. To promote it I've just told everyone I've met and the word has spread through that. I've had about 1300 hits in 2 weeks.
Krisbee: What do you wish comes of it?
Mike Wookey: Just that people will give it a chance, I suppose. Hopefully some will like it and buy my CD.
