Campbell Kneale has been performing under the name Birchville Cat Motel for over a decade. Earlier this month, Kneale performed his last shows throughout Australia and New Zealand as Birchville Cat Motel before he moves on to his next project called Our Love Will Destroy the Earth (incidentally, the title of one of his Birchville Cat Motel Records). In the first of a series of interviews with musicians for ROLLAROLL, I spoke with Kneale about things like his last shows, performing live, influences and the recording industry. Read the interview below:
You recently just performed your last shows under the moniker Birchville Cat Motel, how did that feel?
FanFUCKINGtastic. Im so glad that its over and that I can start afresh. I really feel like its going to be so much more productive for me. I seemed to bump into so many people on tour who were so comiseratory about the whole 'end of Birchville' thing... like they expected me to be really bummed about the whole deal or something. I'm not. Im delighted. Fuck Birchville.
I saw two of your last Birchville Cat Motel performances; one with Antony Milton at This Is Not Art Festival in Newcastle, and your solo stint at Serial Space in Sydney. Both were amazing performances, but there were quite notable differences between them. I saw Domenico Sciajno give a talk after his show for This Is Not Art, and he stated that he had to adjust his sound to the noisy environment in which he performed. Are you subject to changing or adapting your sound to the environment in which you perform in?
Not really. My solo performances are loud. If the room is noisy... i play louder. Easy. I tried my best to specify a large PA for BCM shows and tried my best to get promoters to put me on in places that were going to be appropriate for maximum volume shows. However, every now and then you turn up in a venue and the PA is about the size of a couple of laptop speakers and rather than smoke the poor sad little thing I'll would try and bend to accommodate its meagre output.
However, when me and Antony play together its a totally different thing with a very defined agenda. Strangely, we were supposed to be performing together under our duo name, With Throats As Fine As Needles. When we turned up to Electrofringe we found we were billed as Birchville so I guess a whole bunch of people went away with a rather twisted impression of what constitutues Birchville Cat Motel. Its wasnt a very 'Birchville' performance at all. The Serial Space show WAS Birchville... sand-blasted dronerawk and shamanic lung-shread. With Throats As Fine As Needles gives no thought to ideas like 'continuity' or 'style' other than instrumentation (which in our case is primarily our voices) so each space holds the criteria for an entirely new performance. Yes, we respond... but only because we give no real thought to performing, we simply play with the resources we have available.
What equipment do you use to perform live with?
Oh dear oh dear... You are merely a novice in the ways of this dark magic and as such are not yet privvy to such powerful, galaxy-ripping secrets. Even Antony Milton only knows a secret handshake or two. Yet verily I say unto thee, gear maketh not the rockstar.
On your MySpace account, you list Black Metal as one of the genres your music participates in. The influence of Black Metal seems to me most apparent on a record of yours like Bird Sister Blasphemy, but how do you account for the influence on records like Gunpowder Temple of Heaven?
I dont account for the influence. I like all sorts of music and count them all as influences. The Wedding Present, Cheap Trick, Striborg, Angus MacLise, Brian Eno, Neu!, Ethiopian psyche, The Carter Family, The Stone Roses, Albert Ayler, Van Halen, Henri Gorecki... i can hear it all in the music. I find it curious how easily people latch on to labels... even 'underground music types' who you think would not be so eager to do such a thing. Metal is the new Wolf Eyes. Everybodys doing it. Everybodys waffling on about doom and death and black... people are so boring. I find black metal attractive as it is probably the most 'experimental' kind of metal... its raw and utterly unforgiving yet more about atmosphere than technique. It manages to transcend its own metal-ness and become something else entirely.
Gunpowder Temple of Heaven has nothing to do with black metal... its more like 'Loveless' meets 'Rime of The Ancient Mariner'.
Our Love Will Destroy the World is the name of one of your Birchville Cat Motel records. What was it that drew you to this title, and why have you chosen it as your new moniker?
Titles float in and out of my head in a constant and random fashion... sometimes I manage to retain them for long enough to write them down. That was one that didnt get away. As per usual it holds all the ingredients of my own definition a good title... resonance, mystery, power, fuckedupness.
I felt like it was a good idea to reference my past work, after all, Our Love Will Destroy The World while being something different for me is not THAT different on a surface level to BCM. In fact you'd have to be some kinda autistic mathematical genius to be able to hear the difference at all. The new project is a transformation of ATTITUDE rather than anything to do with music... a new work ethic, a new 'point' and a new chapter for me rather than a whole new book. Our Love Will Destroy The World was the title that seemed most appropriate. Like so much of what I do 'I just like it'. Its not that deep really. Sorry. Ha.
In a recent post of yours, you’ve told us that you intend to release the majority of your work in the future on analogue mediums (vinyl and cassette) only. What are your views on the recording industry at the moment?
Well, I have very little to do with the recording industry personally. Like many of the 'cdr brigade' I really only work via 'gentlemens agreements' with small labels, run by individuals who, almost without exception, are very kind, honest people. Friends in fact.
For what its worth though by means of observation, the 'recording industry' has never really been less relevant. Certainly to me, but i sense perhaps also for the entire 'record buying public'... which less face it is dwindling to almost nothing... who BUYS records released by labels who could be considered 'industry' anymore? I feel like we are reaching another 1977... a bloated, geriatric record industry that has been feeding off the whole compact disc farce for 20-plus years (sorry, when did you say CDs were going to become cheaper?) and now they are getting the big 'fuck you' that they deserve. The global monoculturalism and predominance of hip-hop says it all... there has never been a form of music MORE popular that has had LESS to say. The industry deserves everything they get.
Lastly, when will we hear the first Our Love Will Destroy the World release?
Soon.
Links: Antony Milton, CPSIP, Electrofringe, Our Love Will Destroy the Earth, This is Not Art
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