Rip It Up

Baths Interview

Words By Nina

It’s been a “slow and bizarre” year for US beat-maker Baths [AKA Will Wiesenfeld], who’s about to make his first trip to the other side of the world, Australia. Reflecting back on 2012, he claims the past 12 months have been a frustrating blend of health issues and recording, not to mention emotional draining which has – thankfully – worked rather well in favour of the general atmosphere of his new album.

“I’ve still been fighting with the tail end of being really sick from last year, amidst working hard on a new record,” he says. “It’s been a complex mix of emotions too… I’ve done far, far less touring than I did in 2011 or even 2010. I actually made a conscious effort to do as few shows as possible this year in order to have the time and the space to work on new material. I’m keeping things pretty under wraps until the new album is complete, but I can tell you the tone is much darker than what I’m used to writing. It should be around spring time of 2013 that it comes out.”

In the meantime, Wiesenfeld is making up for lost touring time by heading our way for a series of shows this month – including a highly anticipated set in Adelaide. Having only recently arrived in the country, he confesses he had no idea what to expect from his first visit, Australia always having been one of those exotic places most people only hear about but never get to experience first-hand.

“If you grew up in the States, that’s what it feels like,” he laughs. “It’s the magical beaches and all that… It’s been lovely since I’ve been here. I’m making friends in every city, though I have yet to actually spend an afternoon at the beach! I haven’t been too familiar with the scene at all but the group Empire Of The Sun made my favourite track of either 2011 or 2010 – I can’t remember which year it was. It’s that song, Walking On A Dream – it’s perfect! I’ll always love that song. Love that group too. At the moment I’m listening to this group called Azeda Booth, it’s been my primary listening for the past couple of years. I’ve been listening to a lot of ASMR lately, which is this weird internet subculture of people making relaxing videos of gentle sounds, like fingernails tapping or crinkling paper, sometimes people whispering… It’s mixed with a lot of ambient music. I’m very into music that relaxes me.”

And although his upcoming album is his sole focus right now, Wiesenfeld still occasionally reminisces over the record that earned him global acclaim and opened the doors to the world’s stages. 2010’s Cerulean saw the debut both named as the 21st best album of 2010 by the AV Club, while Pitchfork gave it an ‘Honourable Mention’ in their countdown of best albums of that year… So what was it about Cerulean that captured the world’s attention? Well, Wiesenfeld is still trying to work that out himself…

“No idea,” he says. “Often I find myself having a dialogue with myself about that… I got comparisons to J Dilla and Toro Y Moi which made sense because that was primarily what I was listening to around the time I made that record and a grip of those aesthetics made their way into Cerulean. Lately, though, I’ve veered pretty far from that territory.”

Going back even further, however, Wiesenfeld claims it was Icelandic eccentric Bjork who was a particularly significant influence on his early material – and, in fact, continues to be so to this day.

“Her records are still extremely relevant,” he adds. “I’m still taking cues and ideas from Vespertine and Homogenic all the time. It’s complicated to explain what I love about Bjork, but more than anything, I’d say it was that she has always been herself. That’s sort of the defining thing for me in making music – to never be disingenuous. I fell out of favour with classical music and stopped playing piano at around the age of 12, then when I played the piano again a year or two later, all I wanted to do was write music. I got a computer and MIDI keyboard around the same time, so songwriting and using technology to do so have never been mutually exclusive for me. I’ve always written parts with instruments as well as with production. It works for me.”

WHO: Baths
WHERE: Rocket Bar
WHEN: Thu Nov 22