Are you still aware of what people think of you? Do you still care?
"I think I've got a very good read on my fanbase. I think I do enough research that I'm the expert on who listens to me. It's a very diverse group. Well, not diverse, but different. Now, do I care about it? Yeah! We need to be huge. We need to be huge right now. We're going for broke on it. We’re throwing our lives into this, hoping that we might end up everyone's flavor."
Why do you feel you 'need' to be huge?
"Because it's so easy to not be huge. You're born with that innate. You grow up your whole life that way. No one wants to be that jerk who's desperate to be famous. But we all end up famous anyway. You only get 15 minutes, though. So the trick is to aim high, to try and shoot through the stars. Because it's just a fleeting opportunity. It's like taking snapshots when you're at the top of the Empire State Building. You've gotta take them when you're there, because you're gonna come down soon."
Not many DIY musicians talk this way; it's usually better to be humble, and pretend like any success you've had is an accident.
"I think anybody who pretends that they're being passive, and that the attention that they're getting is in spite of themselves, like they've been putting off their whole career, just cruising through the day doing something altruistic... those are some lengths of bulls**t right there. I think everybody's out there trying to make it. Anybody whose name you've ever read out there, you're bound to find that they've been doing it very concertedly for a very long time. Maybe, once they're successful enough, they can buy into that myth; have a manager there to handle all the mundane, careerist s**t, whilst they get to remain wonderfully aloof, but it's all the same s**t. It's like when you've invest in stock, and somebody else does all the dirty work."
Making Before Today, how did you go about making a record that was the audio equivalent of Ariel Pink going for broke?
"There was not much room for a vision, per se. The ultimate goal doesn't come into it when you're in the middle of the slog. We had to sculpt the thing into its final state just by sitting with the material that we had, just feeling the themes of the record, and finding a good order in the songs. The songs are so eclectic, they're just stuff that the boys have learned over the past year of touring. Once you get in the studio, you just have to go with what you know. You don’t have too much time to dream big when you’re on the clock."
How did it feel ceding some control to other people?
"Oh my God! I'm a baby! This whole time, anytime I'm up against a new obstacle, I flip out. I have my complete kneejerk reaction, threaten to sink the whole ship, and then I have to just suck it up and deal with it. It's a real learning process for me; the more I decide to not abandon ship, the more I agree to making these little concessions here and there, the more I manoeuvre my participation around other people, the way I conduct myself in public... all that stuff affords me more than I would have just being alone in my room, expressing myself like an adolescent. I really don't have to do that anymore. I really got my fill of just recording like a mad-man years ago; I no longer feel that burning urge to get every little last yelp of therapy out. I just try to make stuff that's good."
You equated those early reams of tape recordings as a form of therapy?
"It was. It was therapy for me. But it was probably doing it for all the wrong reasons: to get back at my parents, at cheerleaders, at people I hated, at authority, s**t like that. It was really juvenile stuff. And you think you'll never get over that, but, all of a sudden, it's like: 'whoop-de-doo, now what?' You don't get the same kick out of it. And, past that, once you start getting to go on tour, what do you have to complain about. I manage to get some enjoyment, some distraction, and some structure from going around. It's hard work, and that's gratifying. And people know about me, I’m getting to make my music. I feel acknowledged, I feel loved. It's not therapy anymore."
You've been called the 'godfather of chillwave,' and I know I've spoken to a bunch of people influenced by your records. Is that a huge part of feeling loved?
"It feels great! I'm glad that people give a f**k, man. And I'm definitely surprised. I wouldn't have expected it to resonate this far, this long. I wouldn't have thought it'd happen yet. I thought it would've been the sound of tomorrow. The sound of whatever's next annoying. Or whatever already is. I need to get over whatever I've already laid down, because that's as good as over. I've gotta lay down something new."
I've read a lot of things calling you a 'self-loathing Jew' recently. How does it feel to be publicly labeled such?
"Oh God! Self-loathing Jew? I'm a self-loathing artist, too. Why single Jew out? Why can't I be self-loathing all-around? Jesus! God! Let's come up with something more creative than a self-loathing Jew! It's the ultimate stereotype: what's more Jewish than complaining about being Jewish? Who's more of a Jew than someone complaining about Jews? If Sarah Silverman can do it, why can't I do it? Why am I a f**king anti-Semite? And who is saying that: is it Pitchfork or the f**king ACLU? I guess I just shouldn't talk to Heeb magazine anymore. I'm just stirring up stuff; it's other people who attach the weight, or imagine a sense of belief, into what I'm saying. I just talk s**t. When people ask me stupid questions, I’ll f**king answer."
How stupid a question is being asked if you're an anti-Semite?
"I'm not an anti-Semite! I love Jews. My family are Jews. Do I love my family? Of course I do. Do I like the state of God in the modern world? No, no, f**k no, man. These psychopathic fairytales —these comfort systems for the terrified— are doing the world in. How are we supposed to achieve world peace, or feed the hungry, when we’re getting all nationalistic and territorial? I’m all for one-world. I’m a very one-world kind of guy."
