New Yorker moodists The National find deep-voiced vocal dude Matt Berninger backed by a band of brothers: Scott and Bryan Devendorf on bass/drums, and Aaron and Bryce Dessner on guitars. The Dessner brothers have curated the amazing charity compilation Dark Was the Night, a 2CD set featuring Beirut, Spoon, the Arcade Fire, The Decemberists, Iron and Wine, Cat Power, Yeasayer, Grizzly Bear, Sufjan Stevens, and countless other alternative heavyweights. Prior to its release, Aaron Dessner talked us through its making.
Interview: 24 January 2009
Are the Dessners mixtape makers from way back?
“We used to copy all of our dad’s vinyl onto cassettes, and then make mixtapes. He was kind of an old hippy, so it was all of those obvious classics from the late-’60s. It’s not really how we ended up doing this, but once we had these 31 tracks, it was totally like a test of our mixtape abilities to make an album out of it. So, we went through it a million times, trying to work out how to put all these artists together.”
Were there arguments? Tracklisting tensions?
“Yeah, there was tension. Because there’s so many different ways to look at it. You can put all the biggest bands first. You can put all the rocksongs together. You can go from loud to quiet, or quiet to loud. We just had to find a way to make both CDs feel like they were both flowing, both strong, and that there wasn’t any hierarchy as to which songs were placed where. With the sequencing, you won't hear some of my favorite tracks until over an hour into the compilation.”
Most compilations are truly terrible. Did it feel like you were battling against the odds to make yours meaningful?
“Definitely! Every week there’s another bad charity compilation coming out! But the Red Hot organization has a great track record of actually making good records. A lot of the people on this knew No Alternative. That was the one that had the secret Nirvana track, and Sonic Youth, Pavement, the Beastie Boys. We used it as a standard-bearer. We felt like we had to get quality tracks from people, so it wasn’t enough for someone to say ‘oh, yeah, I have this b-side sitting around.’”
You were the quality control?
“We just didn’t want to be stuck with someone’s crappy tracks. But we weren't that worried. When you ask Bon Iver to do something, or Sufjan or Antony, you know they’re going to do it right. We could’ve made another shitty charity record, but we decided to just be patient, and this whole process ended up taking over two years. Now, we’re shocked at how many amazing tracks there actually are. It’s ended up being a really relevant document of the musical community that we’re a part of.”
You knew most contributors beforehand?
“Most of them. With The National, we found ourselves touring a lot through the past few years, at a time in which independent music was really growing, while the rest of the record industry has been contracting. Most of these people we’d met at festivals, and had their email or phone numbers, so we could just talk to them. It was a very personal exercise; it wasn’t one of those things organised by record-labels and lawyers.”
Did you play match-maker with the collaborations?
“Yeah, we did. All except for the track that Feist did with Ben Gibbard. She recorded a song and sent it to Ben Gibbard, and by the time we heard it was done. In every other case, we worked at matching people up. Like, we’d heard that David Byrne had been listening to Dirty Projectors, and, then, he actually came to see [The National] play, and after the show we cornered him, and asked if he’d be interested in doing that collaboration. He, without hesitation, said ‘absolutely’. And it was kind of like a perfect match.”
Did it ever feel like Dark Was the Night was taking time away from The National?
“Not really. Because, The National was on tour when making this record, and you have so much 'dead' time on the road. It was a good, healthy diversion for us to have. There were times when we were frustrated with the progress, and doomed with the idea that we were making something that doesn’t really need to exist. But, I think our instinct was that this time in independent music is so amazing, and there’s so many really, truly great artists. To get them all together was a special thing. It's only effected The National, now, when we’re supposed to be writing a new album, and we’re stuck promoting it.”
What’s the progress on the next National record?
“Well, we’re right at the beginning, but we’ve done a lot. We’re writing a lot of music that will eventually become parts of The National record, but songs don’t actually exist yet. Our process is really slow, so it could take the rest of this year.”
Why’re you so slow?
“Because it’s this weird democracy that exists in any truly collaborative band. My brother and I write the music, then we take it into the band. We all take these parts, and totally change things around. And Matt, because he doesn’t play any instruments, he’s super on top of us in this phase. Because he can’t really write any words until things resemble songs, he focuses on things hard, and really waits until things are really working. That's how we all are: if one thing doesn’t seem quite right about a song, we throw it away. We’re all quite cynical about rockbands, so there’s an element of self-awareness and self-doubt about it, and we often have to search things out until we feel comfortable in our own skin when performing these songs. We’re always after subtlety and complexity, and, when you’re in a rockband, those are difficult things to capture.”
In this era of the solo project, is the rockband a dying breed?
“I can’t imagine just starting a rockband right now. But, for us, we’ve all done this for a long time, and there’s a certain chemistry in our band that feels timeless, that just exists from long before, from a different era of music. I’ve been playing with my brother since we were kids, 20 years ago, and obviously Scott and Bryan are the same. It just feels like this band is the natural product of that. We’ve never been good at tying into trends, or conceptualizing what we are. Being as self-aware as we are now, there’s no way we could all sit down and start a band at this point."
