On the day before Boston band Vundabar visited to play a special show at Grimey’s, we had the trio in-studio at WNXP to chat about their new record Surgery and Pleasure, which was released March 7. Together since 2012, this is their sixth LP and first on the Loma Vista label.
I told the guys that I found the record to be anxious, overall, and I mean that as a compliment. These 12 tracks — sequenced with the first sung word “hello” and the last “goodbye” — allow the listener to channel nervous energy (there’s plenty to go around, don’t we know it) in alignment with the kinetic energy of a seasoned band totally locked in.
Singer and guitarist Brandon Hagen didn’t disagree, but added, “I feel like it’s psychedelic in a sense where there’s that anxiety and then there are these moments of release and beauty…the sort of tension and paranoia and the come-up then release.”
Hear the full conversation with Hagen, Drew McDonald (drums) and Zack Abramo (bass) here and/or on the WNXP Podcast channel. Find select nuggets of the transcribed chat below.
Record store memories
Brandon Hagen: Drew and I lived in Cambridge when we were sort of getting the band going and there was this record store that’s still around. We were just in Boston the other night, still kicking, called Cheapo Records. And in the back area they would do, I think it was five [records] for $5.
Drew McDonald: Yeah, they had a straight-up dollar bin where everything was a dollar. But also three for $5. And it was some real fun stuff in there.
CG: Totally. So you would crate dig for the low, low price and just come out with all sorts of random things.
BH: Yeah, just get sort of Freak-O random stuff, off-brand, sort of like lost to the era I was from. But it’s always fun. You always find gems and it’s almost more inspiring in a way — even if it’s not good, it’s good, because there’s just something to enjoy about it, whether it’s strange or funny or terrible.
The advent of songs on Surgery and Pleasure
BH: I started writing it and working on it at my own studio shortly after breaking my arm, so I couldn’t play guitar in a conventional way. My arm was in a cast so I could pick out single notes.
CG: Your right arm was broken?
BH: Yes. So it was pluck, no strum. But I was still writing and recording that way. So it sort of like began as a very deconstructed thing. I’m just like, we’ll take all these tracks of like single plucks, put them back together. And I don’t know, it helped me reimagine how to compose a song, how to play guitar, and just shifted my perspective on production a lot cause I was essentially spending a lot more time on production. And then once I was healed, bringing that back to the band, but keeping some of what I learned and the approach. It sort of became the theme of the record and carried through in the production in the studio once we were making the final record. What we wanted the record to sound like is this sort of disjointed, somewhat organic and then somewhat chopped, sort of gnarled on purpose.
CG: I love that you just said chopped. That’s how it feels.
BH: Yeah, we wanted to sound like what it was like to make it.
Maintaining muscle memory for writing and playing
CG: When you talk about ritual on the road, including reading and writing, do you mean writing for pleasure, writing because you need to have the discipline to write new songs, or is it just reflection, like journaling versus songwriting?
BH: It’s not journaling. I guess it’s just sort of staying in the flow of writing and trying to stay regimented. It’s like I’m either in that mode or not and I prefer to just stay in it because if I fall out it’s kind of hard to get back in.
CG: That’s like any other practice, right? People think that in terms of strength training and being athletes, but as a creative person, you gotta keep working those muscles. Do you guys find that to be true with your instruments, as well?
DM: Yeah, I mean, drums are hard because I can’t play drums in the van. [Laughs] So definitely try to take those moments when you can, even if it’s just listening to music and thinking about your instrument as a daily practice. It helps me stay in touch.
Early band memories
CG: Any early band memories you’d want to share since I’m catching up with you now, some 10 years in? Tell me, pop off.
BH: Early memory, hmmm, good or bad?
CG: Chef’s choice.
BH: If they’re bad, they’re funny. We’ve just toured in many of the grimmest of DIY touring.
DM: The Jeep Cherokee Tours.
BH: Oh, yeah, we started touring in a Jeep Cherokee.
CG: That’s pretty small.
BH: Yeah, I’m just glad we started when the bodies can handle it, you know?
DM: When you can sit with your knees up on your chin.
BH: 10 hours straight.
CG: The resiliency, the bounce back. You guys in your formation as a band and being able to grow together musically, but I’m sure like friends-wise too, there must be secrets to that sauce that you could share with maybe younger bands coming up.
BH: I think we’ve spent so much time together we know how to leave each other alone. I feel like that’s the biggest thing.
DM: Learning each other.
Zack Abramo: Just be aware.
BH: There’s no Gallagher brothers in the band. We don’t have like two clashing egos, you know?
Stand-out tracks per band member
“Spades”
BH: That one feels really visual to me. Like nighttime paranoia, a large open space, a car going really fast.
That one [“Spades”] and “I Need You” we recorded and captured live. So many of the other songs had that other approach of just sort of deconstructed and put back together and assembled and then we were just like, “Let’s make sure we have what’s really the the essential version of Vundabar” — just the three of us playing — and so we were like, “Let’s have those two be shining moments of what the three of us can do together.”
“Let Me Bleed”
ZA: We haven’t played “Let Me Bleed” yet, but I love playing that at practice.
CG: OK, why?
ZA: It’s just really fun. Like something about it just goes that I love. It just keeps going. The energy.
DM: Yeah, I love that one too, I was gonna say that. He stole my answer. Well, that one’s fun because it can take so many forms. I think the nature of the song, the recorded version stands out a little bit from the way we’re performing it, but the way were performing it is also fun, too. A little more band-forward.
“I Got Cracked”
DM: I love playing “[I Got] Cracked,” honestly. It was like a challenge for me because it was a little more built-up. So on the drumming side, it took me a long time to kind of figure out how to perform it. But now that we have it, it’s like really frenetic and super fun.