“Grow/Decompose… shares [David Foster] Wallace’s metamodern style – a postmodern web of motifs and strange humour countered with a modernist sincerity and genuine sense of hope …if played on repeat Grow / Decompose never ends, a musical ouroboros of well-worn paths that are both doomed and blessed and quite possibly all we have.”

We were lucky enough to get the opportunity to ask John and Eric from the band a few questions.

Jon: Thanks for speaking to us John. How is life in LA this time of year? Why did you decide to move from Chicago? 

Young Jesus: Life in LA is good. It’s certainly a strange place, easy to let it own you in a way, but also a highly motivating and inspiring place. There is a lot going on here that I really was not exposed to in Chicago. Chicago’s a wonderful place for me in many ways, but it became ‘home’ too much. I had an idea of what it was in my mind, so I wasn’t really open to a lot of the interesting things the city had to offer. It became a place where I drank a lot and played a lot of videogames. Both have their merits, but I personally needed to get out. It’s interesting that Home, to me, is a pretty straightforward record– almost journalistic. And I was hazy and drunk through a lot of it. Grow / Decompose is meandering, questioning, more subtle I hope. But I’ve never been more clear-headed. I guess the easier it is to think, the more questions come.

One thing I’ve noticed while reading up on Young Jesus is that no-one seems to agree as to who you sound like. I’ve seen Smashing Pumpkins, The Replacements, Staind, The National etc. etc., while I picked up some strong Hold Steady vibes, both in terms of your writing style and the dark-and-joyful sound. Do your listening habits reflect this wide(ish) range comparisons? Or are journalists and bloggers trying too hard to pin your sound? 

We listen to a lot of different things. From The Hold Steady and Pile to William Basinski and Stars of the Lid. It all plays a part in the thinking of a record. It might not be obvious while listening, but our musical influences affect things beyond melody/rhythm. Little eccentricities come out in strange ways. That’s what makes it interesting hopefully.

As a follow-on to that, how do you feel after releasing a new record to the world? Do you like that reviewers each come to their own conclusions? Or do you feel pretty certain of the narrative you’re trying to conjure? I was kind of guilty of bringing a lot of my own thoughts into my review of the album, and I guess I was conscious that perhaps that isn’t always a good thing for the artist? 

We have a narrative in our heads definitely. But a huge part of the narrative is that there is no absolute correct narrative. We’re glad to see people put their own interpretations on it cause that means they’re interacting with it. They’re having a similar process sorting through the album that we had sorting through life to create the album. I have a huge mental picture of records like Brand New’s Devil and God… or Weezer’s Pinkerton. And it’s probably so different from how they view it! That’s so great. That we ultimately have a point of intersection/relation and have– potentially– come to it from totally different places. Albums (as Roger Ebert said about movies) can be machines that generate empathy.

Grow / Decompose, just like your previous album Home, seems to focus on a defined set of themes and characters in a way that makes it not quite a traditional album but perhaps not quite a concept album. How do you feel about the term ‘concept album’ in relation to your releases? 

I became pretty engrossed in this album over the past year. It took over my life in a lot of ways. I gave myself to this record rather than to people, and at one point couldn’t really see a love that was there for me because I was so absorbed in the story/writing. I loved Neil, Milo, and May. So the concept is a strange reflection of life. Grounded in reality. Without a traditional arc because life doesn’t have that. Some things end, some don’t.

There is a decidedly novelistic feel about your writing. Would you say literature has an influence on your writing style? (If yes) Which authors would you say have had the biggest impact? 

I work in a bookstore and am reading more than I’m listening to music probably. Literature has had a major influence. The five main books are Hilda Hilst’s The Obscene Madam D, Clarice Lispector’s Near to the Wild Heart, Mircea Cartrescu’s Blinding, Wise Blood by Flannery O’Connor, and Suicide by Edouard Leve. And Muriel Spark. So six. These books very literally changed my life this past year. Oh and Jesse Jacobs By This Shall You Know Him.

Lispector/Cartrescu/Hilst showed me that it was okay (and beautiful) to think in absurd, non-normative logics. That you could create your own, and these logics are capable of carrying emotional/sentimental weight.

Reading Leve felt like breaking the law. It’s a work he turned in to his publisher and soon after killed himself. In fact, I could read it and feel safer. I do think it is a dangerous book, not for everyone, but for me it was a powerful life-affirming read. Almost named the record Les Atomes which is a band mentioned in one of Leve’s books (either Suicide or Autoportrait, I forget).

O’Connor and Spark deal with religion (specifically Christianity) in a rare way. They are ultimately believers, but are not afraid of examining the grotesque byproducts of belief. It’s easy to write off organized religion, maybe a bit harder then to look at it very honestly and specifically and turn the lens onto yourself as well. I’m an atheist, but some of my favorite thinkers (Spark, O’Connor, Jeff Mangum) are oddly Christian. Who knows what that means. Time to become a priest.

With its stories of addiction and general sadness shot through with a sense of hope, I compared Grow / Decompose to David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest. Where do you stand on the whole irony vs. sincerity debate? Do you subscribe to the New Sincerity movement, or do you feel cynicism and darkness have role to play in the best, most enlightening/comforting art?   

I think you can confront darkness with sincerity and that the best stuff acknowledges the light that is in the dark and vice versa. We’re on board and interested with what New Sincerity could be about, and if people want to group us in with that, that’s okay. But we can also be sarcastic and ironic. So watch out.

You guys run the label Hellhole Supermarket that is putting out Grow / Decompose and take care of all of your own press and management. Is this sort of control important to you? I mean, I know there are some great labels out there, and some PR companies who make the effort to connect as human beings, but I can’t tell you how nice it is to get personal emails from acts about their new music. Does this increased involvement lead to a more rewarding process overall? Or is it an annoyance that gets in the way of music (or watching TV or whatever)?

I always tell Harrison, “if this label gets in the way of BBT (Big Bang Theory) one more time I’m gonna lose my smoothie.” I love those bang boys.

Finally, could you name 4-5 artists you are currently enjoying? They can be old or new, hidden gems or radio darlings, whatever you find yourself returning to at the moment.

Fragile Gang‘s For Esme, Pope, Mitski, Princess Reason, Earl Sweatshirt (‘solace’ is connecting a lot today).

Read our review of Grow / Decompose and then buy the album from Bandcamp or Hellhole Supermarket.

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“When my grandmother died several years ago my dad came into my room in the morning and sat at my bedside. he woke me and told me he had to fly out to mexico for the funeral. he told me i had to take care of the dogs. when he left the room i started crying—not because my grandmother had passed away, but because i was overwhelmed, in that moment, by the prospect of taking care of the dogs. this was probably my first encounter with loss since my first dog, jazzy, died. after i cried i was frustrated because i knew i had cried for the wrong reasons. i didn’t mourn right.”

The piece continues through various tales of grief, expanding on Jazzy the dog and musing about why cemeteries are so grim and unpleasant, before ending with:

“h*ckhound is a skeleton dog that appears in my room every night at the witching hour. it runs in circles on my bed, chasing its tail, and when i try to hold it in my arms it crumbles into dust.”

The piece is obviously linked to the album thematically (songs include ‘Dig My Bones’ and ‘Dog Burial Theme’) but the reason I’m mentioning it now is that is represents the record in another way. The writing is strange and concise, moving quickly from one event to another and not overly bothered if you the listener can keep up. As an album, H*ckhound is the exact same way. We go from the ear-bleeding, throat-shredding ‘Vomiting Multitude’ to the loved-up pop-punk promise of ‘Terminal Knuckleheads’ and then the pensive strum-along of ‘This is the New Home’. ‘Strange November’ is a laid back garage jam and ‘Stylites’ accelerates back up to 100mph before the unexpected but lovely ambience of ‘Dog Burial Theme’.

H*ckhound plays like the anxious survivor of some tragedy, troubled but sincere, full of love to give and lose and so desperate to prove it he drags you along by the arm and pleads into your ear in a constant flow. It’s as if some mad scientist forced The Replacements, Black Lips, Weezer and God knows who else into a blender and set the resulting gloop in bone-shaped jelly moulds. 

You can get the album now on a pay-what-you-can basis via Bandcamp or on cassette from King Pizza Records.

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Musically, the album is a patchwork of influences. The uplifting refrains of Modest Mouse, the energy of Dinosaur Jr., the strangeness of Flaming Lips, autotune, a rap verse (!)… all of these bind together to form an album that is experimental yet undeniably pop music. This is a dynamic album that refuses to settle into one box, accelerating and decelerating at will, changing from boisterous (‘The Hardest Question’, ‘Gemini’ etc.) to poignant (‘Mom and Dad’, ‘Greater Then’, etc) with little warning, and it’s all the better for it. It kind of brings to mind experimental legends The Mae Shi, or rather, The Mae Shi covering Arcade Fire and Cursive and Weezer and Miley Cyrus (trust me) and God knows who else. It is every bit as good as this sounds.

Greenleaf is a close friend of Henry Crawford, AKA Small Wonder (who we featured here), and Crawford appears on the album. In fact, you could say he does more than that: “Jack Greenleaf and Henry Crawford have been writing songs together for as long as anyone can remember,” says The Epoch page, “if you are listening to a Small Wonder song, you are also listening to Sharpless whispering along behind the singing. When you listen to Sharpless, Small Wonder sits nearby, playing along on the floor.“ In a world of blog-driven buzz bands and label-pushed clones, it’s good to know that communities like this still exist. The pair have even put out a small release together, which you can hear here.

You can buy The One I Wanted To Be via Bandcamp, where there are plenty of past releases to explore too. Be sure to keep up with The Epoch, they are involved in some great stuff at the moment.

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The covers include Weezer, Thin Lizzy, Velvet Underground, The Replacements, Spider Bags, Television Personalities, Cock Sparrer, Bobby Fueller and the Hot Pockets theme – an interesting lineup I’m sure you will agree. The alt. versions are also well worth a listen. The drop in pace for ‘My Time Outside the Womb’ suits it very well, showing that Titus could easily take up making different sounds should they ever want to. The Real Estate-esque slowed down rock is an interesting take on a traditionally high-tempo song.

P.S. This version of the mixtape was uploaded by a Twitter user called @danielguntrip who added all the correct song titles, tags and that sort of thing. The artwork was by another Twitter user, @noahremainsanon. Follow them, they must be decent guys to make the effort.

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