Deerhoof
Interview with Greg Saunier
Words: PJ Cheng
Photos: Asha Schecter

Deerhoof is weird.  Hyperactive drums pound in sharp-shifting patterns. Guitars shriek with jarring chords and turbulent melodies.  The vocals squeak like a child's shrill.  The juxtaposition of these tonal variants can make digesting their music difficult.  But weirdness is often misunderstood and there is more to the mayhem than just erratic noise.  To appreciate Deerhoof is to appreciate the themes and concepts that go into every album.  More importantly, it is to appreciate the basic reason upon which they deliver every spastic beat, screwy riff and whacked-out rhythm.  "We just try to play what's in our heads and in our hearts and in our bodies," said Greg Saunier, founding member and the band's violent beat-thrashing centerpiece, "sometimes what comes out sounds strange to people but it's not because we're trying to be strange."  Much like a child's conniption fit, the music is the result of raw expression.  Deerhoof is pure music-making and in this interview, Saunier discusses the loss of a band member, the new album and the impact their music has had on everybody from grade-schoolers, to film directors, to music icons.
 
REAX:  “Friend Opportunity” has a few more electro-beats, synth-noises and includes one piano ballad and an 11-minute track.  Aside from a new lineup, how much has changed since “The Runners Four?”
Greg Saunier:  It wasn't a matter of the band changing in the period between the two albums.  More that we just started from total scratch when we started recording this one.  Each of us writes songs but every new song that one of us presents is a surprise.  Usually it's embarrassing to present a new song to our band mates because new songs usually sound nothing like any of our old songs.

REAX:  Deerhoof has gathered acclaim from artists such as Sonic Youth and Sufjan Stevens.  Did you ever think it would translate to grade school kids?  How did you feel about seeing “Milk Man” interpreted as a ballet by a drama teacher, choreographed by an art and P.E. teacher and performed by youthful tikes? 
GS:  No.  I never dreamed something like that would happen.  Not because it was too strange; because it seemed too good to be true.  We were overwhelmed with joy when Courtney Naliboff said she wanted to make a theatrical presentation of Milk Man.  When we were making the album we were thinking of it as a kind of campy music theater piece for kids.  So it was incredible that she somehow sensed that and wanted to take it upon herself to make it happen.  We saw our music take on a life of its own and become something completely new that was independent of us.  The performance was amazing.  They have our highest respect.

REAX:  Do you get the same satisfaction from watching "C" acted out by a community grade school as you do getting requests from Radiohead and The Flaming Lips to be their tour openers?
GS:  Both things were incredible to us; almost unbelievable to me even now.  Radiohead was already huge in our hearts before they contacted us.  For years, we used to go back and forth between their CDs and our rough mixes when we were working on our recordings because we wanted to make music that could FOLLOW theirs.  We considered Radiohead to be a "call" and we wanted to make a "response", if that makes any sense.  When they wrote us, we realized that they had heard our response and were into it.  And while we were making Friend Opportunity, it was even crazier because instead of going between their CD and our rough mix, we were literally going between their live show and our rough mix.  We mixed the album while we were on tour with them, which was a challenge because their live shows were like the best thing I'd ever seen.  And then the same thing happened with The Flaming Lips.  We were also obsessed with At War With The Mystics.  We were desperately trying to make our stuff as clear and powerful and insane-sounding as theirs.