Superlatives
A Vulture series in which artists judge the best and worst of their own careers.
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We have a lot of fans who self-identify asnerds.We never thought of ourselves as nerds.
That was a very harsh pejorative when we were growing up.
I try not to get distracted by that.
We proceed to talk about his latest solo project, an impressive EP written and recordedentirely in ancient Latin.
No nerd alert here.
We spoke to Linnell about the highs and lows of TMBG.
Most Overrated Album
This is gonna sound really weird, but I thinkFloodis overrated.
People really focus on that third album; it obviously made the biggest impact.
Maybe Im misjudging it, but I tend to focus on the things that dont sound very well defined.
I know thats a really dumb way to assess your own work.
I likeFlood.I like hearing stuff that I havent heard in a while.
Its kind of exciting and weird to check it out.
John and I were just talking aboutMink Caron somebodys podcast yesterday.
Unfortunately, it came out onSeptember 11, 2001.
So that rollout was probably dented somewhat by that appalling catastrophe.
We had to delay the tour, and it probably impacted this sales generally.
Maybe in the fullness of time, people are like,That was weird, but that was interesting.
Favorite Cover
Flansburgh generally picks the covers, and he wanted to do Norma Tanega.
Shes this brilliant artist who died recently.
I wish we could write a song that good.
Favorite Song for a Cartoon/Commercial/TV Theme
Jeez, I dont know.
This sounds really odd, but we had a great time recording jingles for the Dunkin Donuts corporation.
Probably not one of the mostcredthings weve ever done.
But it was actually really satisfying, and of course we got free doughnuts.
Favorite Character from a Song
People love old Particle Man.
Particle Man is this sort of sad-sack character that I think elicits sympathy.
I guess I dont really think too hard about those characters, the narrators of our songs.
A lot of them are reflections of our most self-loathing notions.
Do you know what I mean?
I dont know what quintessential me really is.
I dont know how I smell, because Ive never stopped smelling myself.
Most Flansburghian Song
I cant reduce it to one song, obviously thats impossible.
Hes just a rainbow of ideas.
Its very hard to pin him down to one song.
But I can tell you what my favorite Flansburgh songs are.
Theres a song called Impossibly New, and I guess Spot a Spy.
Those are five Flans songs that are very Flansburghy to me, but also just amazing songs.
Its partly to do with the spontaneity of his writing.
My sense of his process is that he lets his guard down and then something comes out.
I dont know if thats exactly true, but thats what it feels like.
I dont know how to write songs.
I just do it.
I still dont know.
I have never really come up with the formula.
So its always a musical idea that comes first, which is trying to set the vibe.
And then I kind of cast around for lyrics.
That, for me, is the really hard part.
Ive never been able to figure out an easy way to satisfy myself with lyric writing.
It actually always seems impossible.
I think that about crossword puzzles as well.
Im really really happy having finished this work, but I wasnt particularly happy about doing the work.
But I like writing songs.
I dont like doing the work, but I like the satisfaction of having done the job.
Last year we learned how to play one of our songs, Sapphire Bullets of Pure Love, backward.
We were on tour and we got to play it a few times.
I found a roll of film from a disposable camera and got it developed.
I didnt know what was on it.
And it was the 2018 show that we did in New York, just a lot of backstage pictures.
I think the context has changed so much that youre always doing something different.
The river has moved past that time.
We cant write Ticket to Ride because that time has passed.
Simplest Song
Lyrically, I would go back to Minimum Wage.
Its an almost minimalist idea; just two words in the lyrics, but very effective.
We tend to go in the other direction.
Its sort of a psychedelic idea, I guess.
Its maybe not even all that coherent.
We had these gigantic hands that wed wear and stuff like that.
I look back fondly on all of that stuff.
It has to be worth it.
The spotlight would just be on them, and they would sing one of the songs.
And we have actually revived the stick a number of times.
Im sure that will make its way back into the show at some point.
Its a big tree limb that Flansburgh pounds on the ground.
Traditionally, it has a microphone duct-taped onto it.
And the sound is going through this 80s-style gated reverb.
So it has this kind of superPhil Collins smashing sound that just abruptly cuts off.
And thats something that is actually not that hard to rig up, and its very effective.
So thats one that we could totally bring back.
Your (Now Grown-Up) Kids Favorite TMBG Song
I have to ask him.
I have no idea.
He likes the band, which he didnt always.
It put me in my place.
So we played a bunch of songs fromThe Else.
That was very informative.
We didnt get a full band until the fourth album, and that was halfway through the tour.
So we did quite a lot of stuff as a duo.
Its fun to play Ana Ng with a full band.
And that was done with drum machines and using the computerized noise gate on the guitar.
It sounds like it was constructed in the studio.
But I really like our live version now with the full band.
