“Music is a form of communication that can be more timeless than the written word” : Best Fit meets Poor Moon

Christian Wargo isn’t always as happy as he sounds; but he usually is. As an active member of Fleet Foxes and the songwriting engine behind nascent band Poor Moon (their first EP appearing in March, and their eponymous debut LP available as of next week), Wargo’s proclivity is one of bright vocal harmonies and doe-eyed, acoustic folk melodies. From where does he derive such endless and undefeated optimism? One phone call to Seattle, and a few things come to light. As well as to a starry lack thereof.

“I received a package from my dad with some old issues of Life Magazine that I’m sifting through and it’s pretty amazing.” Wargo offers, unprompted. “I got one here… it’s from July 1959. There’s probably 20 ads for cigarettes… Equally as many ads for alcohol. Here’s an ad talking about the health benefits of malt instant beer… A depressing article about aging people in America with all these really sad quotes, like, “I’m 80-years-old and no one wants to talk to me.” Here’s another for , and it’s got a mom and daughter and like an apron. The mom is waxing the wood paneling on the wall, while the daughter takes care of floor…” He goes on to describe an ad for ‘Sugar-Coated Corn Flakes’ which features a personified corncorb sprinking sugar on the cornflakes with a magic wand. “It wasn’t even that long ago, but it still seems so primitive.”

It seems that Wargo genuinely wants to share these bits of time-capsulated intrigue, and only incidentally revealing something about his own modis operandi as a musician, this perfect little allegory rolled up in his back pocket.

“History is definitely something that fascinates me,” he says. “You get a snapshot of the mentality just by looking at a magazine like this, and you think of the music that was coming out around the same time. Which in some ways is more timeless and can speak… You can listen to a piece of music from this time period and not necessarily get a sense of what people’s mindset was like. In the same way you do when you’re flipping through a magazine like this. I don’t know, I find that that interesting. I don’t necessarily have a conclusion about what that means, but maybe just that music is a form of communication that can be more timeless than the written word. I find it interesting.”

So is Wargo’s music completely derived from digging through cardboard boxes in the attic and the contents of estate sales?

“Not so much. I feel like at least with Poor Moon and Fleet Foxes too, there is a modern twist on it. I don’t feel that it’s so referential that it should be catalogued under ‘retro music.’ It’s just informed by stuff that I happen to listen to a lot of music from that time and prefer the recording techniques, for as long as I can remember, that sought out the vintage instruments, just because I prefer the sound, as opposed to like a digital instrument or some samples or some imitation of an actual instrument. I prefer to use the actual acoustic version of it. I just feel like the tones are purer. Recording-wise, something I’ve always been interested in, is tape and vintage equipment. That tends to steer the way that I record things.”

In the number of bands he’s been in over the years (in addition to Fleet Foxes and Poor Moon, he’s also played in Danielson Famile, Pedro the Lion, and Crystal Skulls) Wargo’s shuffled between bass, guitar, glockenspiel, all played with equal-minded authority. His renaissance-ishness, he says, stems from his earliest interactions with music.

“I started playing music when I was around 11. I had this weird old boombox that had two channel inputs, so I started making songs with two tracks. And eventually I think when I was probably 13, I picked up my first 4-track. And I just started collecting instruments. I was never taught in any particular instrument. It was pretty much by ear, so I wasn’t really intimidated to pick up whatever I could get my hands on. I had like Hawaiian harps, guitars, weird old keyboards, anything that someone would loan me or give me, or that I could find at a garage sale or something. I can get a tune out of anything eventually just by listening and I don’t know the chords per se. And I’ve never taken music theory, so I just sort of pick out chords one note at a time. Having done it so long, I’ve gathered a repertoire of things that I know how to play. I can play drums, anything I can put my hands on I can get a tune out of. It’s just fun.”

In a sense, his work with Poor Moon is really just an extension of what he’s been doing since he was 11. He is imaginably just more capable of growing facial hair now (which comes in handy). But that bewonderment is still there. He’s still just playing with his Tinker Toys. Only, he has learned to play well with others.

“Recording in my bedroom is something I’ve always done. That’s pretty much how these songs came to be. I just made these kind of fully formed demos with all the parts sketched out, and I bring that to the band and we elaborate on it, and divvy up the instrumentation. Sometimes it’ll change or we’ll simplify it, because sometimes I like to try to record with a specific amount of people in mind. So that when I play live I’m not leaving out a string section or something that’s integral to the sound of the recording that people are familiar with. I’ve always wanted to keep things at least limited enough to where a band could perform it live.”

Wargo describes the pleasure he derives from self-limitation, in collaboration and recording, and how sometimes it’s more fulfilling to do it the old fashioned way, learning to be patient while tape rewinds, as opposed to relying too heavily on the the complacency-enabling of digital recording technology. All of which makes, he feels, for a better musician.

These practices, it would seem, also result in a better appreciation of music as a listener. Wargo says he values the commodity of being able to download a single from something off the Top 40 (having very nice things to say about R. Kelly and Beyonce) when he wants to enjoy something casually. But he finds the best way to appreciate an artist he admires requires a turntable and an allotted 30 to 60 minutes. As it turns out, both Fleet Foxes and Poor Moon record their music with the intention of having it released on vinyl.

With Poor Moon, Wargo is very much the arbiter of the band, much in contrast to his position with Fleet Foxes, which he says came about when they needed an additional voice to fill out the harmonies. But he values each role alike, and in their own separate ways.

“I like both roles of writing the song or just being the supportive role,” he explains. “It’s just fun to be involved in something that I believe in… It’s a totally different sort of vibe when I’m writing everything and in charge – it’s a lot more work. I learned a lot, being in that, and being involved in that environment. It’s really all I’m trying to do, get better, and so putting myself in different situations is fun.” But sometimes with Fleet Foxes, it can feel like recreation has no place. Wargo adds, “It’s got a different set of challenges, being in the ‘hotseat’ – as we call it in Fleet Foxes – when you’re in the studio recording. I’ll be trying to lay down some bassline and I’ll do ten passes through the song, and everyone will just be in the control room like, ‘I don’t know, it might be to this or too that, or not enough this or not enough that,’ and you’re like, ‘all right I’ll try again, let me do this.’”

It is clear that Robin Pecknold is the meticulous, Paul Simon-esque driving force behind Fleet Foxes, and Wargo describes the type of relationship he and Pecknold have, and why it’s important in music to maintain a good one: “He doesn’t necessarily always know what he wants. It’s difficult to express musical ideas, but that’s what I value about being in a band as opposed to a singer/songwriter or being a session musician. It takes a long time to develop trust and a musical language to develop these ideas to each other. If collaboration was easy, then I think everyone would just do it. You have to sort of invest in the people, or invest in their ways of thinking. Finding people who are willing to do that with you is always a challenge so I’m thankful I’ve had people in my life where I’ve had musical relationships with these people for like 14 years now. So someone like Casey Wescott who was in Poor Moon and Fleet Foxes with me. There’s less that needs to be explained with him, then if I brought in some wailing keyboard player that can play anything, trying to communicate what I want would be difficult. Whereas with Casey, we have this sort of frame of reference that’s subtle and unspoken. We just sort of know. That’s why I prefer to be in bands and stick with it.”

Wargo discusses that feeling of excitement leading up to the release of a first album, and how there was less excitement so much as a certain pressure leading up to the release of the second Fleet Foxes album. He says he is satisfied with the results of Helplessness Blues, but that he operates a lot better when things happen naturally and hastelessly: “I don’t like trying to force things or rush things. I can do that, but it’s more fun for me if I can take my time.” Which is how the blueprints for Poor Moon came about, developing material whilst a part of Crystal Skulls, and finally getting to the point where he felt he had accrued enough songs to create something (and had the time to do it while the Fleet Foxes hibernate).

On Poor Moon’s new self-titled LP, the material ranges from ‘Birds’, which was written in between Wargo’s membership stints in Crystal Skulls and Fleet Foxes (although the signature harmonies suggest straight off-the-boat Foxes), to ‘Come Home’ which was written while the album was being recorded and is full of little “place-holders” that Wargo felt needed to be on the album in some shape or form. “It sort of just comes together like a puzzle,” he explains.

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A lot of spontaneous magic can happen in the studio, things Wargo never anticipates prior to bringing his demos to the rest of the band. He offers an instance: “While we were recording ‘Phantom Light’, I had that intro guitar part and a couple verses. Then when Casey and I got together, he thought, ‘I felt like the song had a sort of mechanical vibe,’ so he started composing that complicated harpsichord part. And then Josh came over, and I was sort of struggling with how the rhythm was going to work, because the guitar part is sort of in weird timing, so he just started laying down these free tracks, which at the time didn’t make any sense, but over time… I thought, ‘Wow, this is like a little world. I really feel like the rules of reality don’t apply and this thing just exists in its own universe.’”

Sounding a bit like a God, he says, “You create this thing that people can escape to, including me, and I just thought it was a neat little thing.”

And what a wonderful place to visit, this album is. At least if you don’t pay attention to the actual lyrics, which Wargo says are written only after the music foundation is laid-out. He explains, “There’s tons of death on this album. I felt like we had all gone through 30, in the the past four or five years. We all sort of experienced that ‘Holy shit, I’m actually thirty.’ It wasn’t exactly a midlife crisis or anything – well maybe – but it definitely causes you to reflect in weird ways, and I felt like my way of dealing with that is, ‘Oh well it’s all sort of happening, whether you like it or not.’ And in a lot of ways it’s cool to know more what you want, and the older you get the more you feel sure about what you don’t want and what you do want. Lyrically, a lot of these songs reflect that sort of resigned approach to dealing with mortality. And if I was attempting anything, it was to inject a bit of humor, or just a peculiar way of thinking about these things, or a romanticised way of thinking about it.”

“The feed of every song is whatever I happen to be dealing with or where my headspace is at. The two or three lines that come out of rambling when you’re playing a guitar part, I think you expound upon that idea which I believe is born out of personal experience. And then I can either take a very direct personal approach to it, or what I really feel like I do is fictionalise it or sort of bring in a character to take an outside perspective to it. But really it’s ultimately like looking in the mirror. It’s just a way of dealing with stuff, and communicating something that makes you feel more human or that seems like something other people deal with and can relate to. At least that’s the music that resonates with me. I tend to be drawn to songs that are odd or have a peculiar point of view, because I feel like that is where my head is at a lot of times.”

He goes on to talk about a documentary he watched a few years ago called the Mindscape of Allan Moore [author of graphic novels like V for Vendetta, Watchmen, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen]. He recounts a quote that resonated with him in particular, paraphrasing: ”Back in the day there were shamans in the village and people would go to the shaman to get a different perspective on things, the same way they would go to the hunter to get food. It wasn’t this separate, people just needed some perspective, so ‘I’ll go check out the shaman.’ And he related shamanism to magic, and then magic to art, because he was like art was a manipulation of words and symbols to change consciousness and to give people what they need or are looking for. I thought that was a neat way of looking at things – not that I want to walk around talking about myself being a shaman or anything like that.”

Wargo expresses on several occasions a certain (well) uncertainty that comes with being a musician. He defines a frequent ‘VH1 Behind the Music’ misconception that the feeling of success is constant, as are daily pats on the back. He describes what sounds like an emotional rollercoaster, of muddied waves of love/hate from critics and fans alike. That’s not to mention conflicts left completely internal, and alternating pangs of self-doubt and self-esteem. “Sometimes when you’re making music, you’re like, ‘Why am I doing this?’ besides the sort of cathartic, and just ‘it’s fun,’ and whatever purpose for feeding my ego. You feel like deep down there is a sort of reason or you want to feel like you are contributing something that is meaningful in someway.”

He also says, “I feel grateful that someone like me that doesn’t know music the way a whole bunch of talented people who have studied music for years. It really is about being persistent and about doing something from a genuine love for doing it, and that’s the only reason I can think of that I’ve been able to do the things that I do.”

Wargo is recognisant of the highly-critical and cynical world he lives in and releases his music into, but that doesn’t mean he necessary accepts it all, hard as he tries: “The same way it’s difficult to convey musical ideas to your own band members, I think it’s difficult to write about music or art of any kind and to do it in a way that really conveys what the experience of listening to music is like. But the sort of snarky criticism or the sort of snarky ‘we’re going to bash this,’ or nothing-is-cool mentality that has really come as a result of blogs and music criticism online. I feel it is a relatively new thing. And it has become this sort of snarky, unencouraging thing.”

“I’ll read a couple comments, and I listen to it so very little, but occasionally someone will come on to a link on Youtube of like a song that was posted and be like [changes voice], ‘This just sounds like every other bearded rocker. Here check out my band.’ And it’s terrible. This is actually the worst thing I’ve heard in the world. But the people who are most critical are the ones who seek out the most approval, or have some sort of other agenda, and always want to point the finger back at themselves in some way. To hype themselves, or congratulate themselves. Or have some kind of insecurity about what their doing. They have to hate everything else around them to validate what they’re doing.”

But Wargo knows better than to let the critics, cyber-trolls and assorted other haters drag him or his work down, saying, “You can’t buy into any of it just like you can’t buy into the praise. You can’t let what anybody says affect what you do. Because if you believe the hype, that affects you in a negative way. And that’s not the purpose of it. And if that becomes the purpose, then I feel like things are going wrong. You can’t do it for the praise, and you can’t be affected by the criticism. Although there are times when you’re just human and you can’t help it – like you read a review and you’re like, “Man they almost had it and I wished they had it,” but whatever. And it might bum me out for that day or something, or maybe they hit on something and maybe there’s some merit to it, but ultimately you can’t live for the recognition or be affected by the criticism.”

It would seem sincerity is something you’ll be hard-pressed to find these days, unless you happen to be flipping through a vintage magazine, full of ads that aren’t out to gouge or manipulate. Perhaps that is why Wargo is so fond of escaping via these dated-mediums-turned-time-machines. Perhaps there really is something better back there, that isn’t treated with the kind of hostility or rejection by the forces who have the power to make such a great stench, knowing that all our nostrils are somehow inseparable.

“I think when sincerity becomes a key selling point, you become sort of allergic to it.,” Wargo comments. “We’re definitely living in a day and age when everyone feels like they’ve seen and heard it all before, and it’s hard to get someone to care, but we all build up against feeling and will avoid conflict and sadness in anyway possible. I feel like when someone comes along and says something in a new way, people respond to it and it’s not a crime to be sincere. I feel like even someone like Beyonce – I feel like she’s hella sincere – and I’ve watched footage of her warming up backstage and there’s this video of Jay-Z filming her warming up in her dressing room and she’s singing this song that I feel like is about her and him, and she’s fucking going for it in her dressing room. And not in anyway that I think anyone was watching or she thought anyone would see it. You can’t fake that sort of thing.”

Poor Moon is available now through Bella Union and the band will perform at the following dates:

31 Aug 2012 – Larmer Tree Gardens, Salisbury, UK
01 Sep 2012 – The Ruby Lounge, Manchester, UK
03 Sep 2012 – The Lexington, London, UK
06 Sep 2012 – Botanique, Brussels, Belgium
07 Sep 2012 – La Fleche, Paris, France
10 Sep 2012 – Comet Club, Berlin, Germany